


Fire Over the Holy City

by thesepossessedbylight



Series: Fire Over The Holy City [2]
Category: Holby City
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/F, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Spies, WWII!AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-22
Updated: 2017-03-27
Packaged: 2018-09-11 01:31:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 31,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8947816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesepossessedbylight/pseuds/thesepossessedbylight
Summary: 1941. Recently invalided from German-occupied France with a bullet in her spine that should've killed her, Major Bernie Wolfe of the Special Operations Executive is sent to work in a hospital in Clydebank (nicknamed the Holy City), a small, industrial town outside Glasgow. Convinced she'll hate it, Bernie is unprepared for the friendship which blossoms between herself and Serena Campbell, head of the trauma ward. But Hitler has no intention of leaving the Clyde alone, and soon the wail of the bombers' sirens will be heard again...





	1. Home Again

**Author's Note:**

> kirk = church (in this case, Presbyterian).  
> Jerry = German  
> faither = father, according to my mum, who spoke a Clydebank dialect called (I think?) Lalands when she was young.  
> muckle = another Lalands word, meaning ‘a lot’ (or maybe ‘very’).

Major Dr Bernie Wolfe stepped off the train at Glasgow’s central station and shivered. It was a cold January day and the train had been delayed several hours from London because of snow on the tracks. Bernie glanced at her watch, wrapping her military-style coat around her with her free hand: 1700 hours already, and there was no way she’d be able to make her 1730 appointment with her new landlady. She sighed, casting an eye around the station. Deserted: not a porter in sight. The war really had changed things, she thought, eyeing the empty information desk. Even London was less empty than this, and they had been bombed by Jerry air raids every night for the past four months. ‘The blitz,’ they were calling it, and Bernie thought she’d never seen a more disingenuous name: there was nothing fast or ‘lightning’ about this war. No, London had turned into a war zone almost overnight, and Bernie wanted nothing more than to go back. She sighed, nudging the suitcase at her feet with a toe as she stuck both hands into her pockets for warmth.

The train behind her gave a belch of smoke and groaned loudly, starting its journey out of the station. Well, this was it, she thought grimly. No going back to London now.

“Excuse me, miss?”

Bernie turned, nearly tripping over her suitcase. A small child stood a few feet away, wrapped in a gigantic coat several sizes too big for it. 

“Only you look a little lost, and my faither said if you were going somewhere he could take you in our car.” 

Bernie smiled at the child, and the child poked its face further out of the coat and grinned: a boy, maybe ten years old, with bright ginger hair. 

“That would be very thoughtful,” Bernie said. “Are you sure he wouldn’t mind?” 

“Not at all,” the boy said. “That’s him over there,” and he pointed towards a man of medium height walking towards them, towing another child. The man had dark eyebrows and hair and a wry, Scottish face, and Bernie felt an odd mixture of homecoming and repulsion. 

“Hullo,” the man said, when he reached Bernie, and he stuck out his hand. “I’m Raf. I hope you don’t mind - you looked a little lost, and I still have a car and a petrol allowance, so I thought I could help.”

Bernie shook his hand genially. Raf’s Glaswegian accent was unmistakeable, and she said, “I’m Major - I’m, I’m Bernie. I’d really appreciate the lift, if you wouldn’t mind. I’m meant to be staying in Kilbowie Road, in Clydebank?” 

Raf’s eyebrows lifted in surprise. “That’s the road we live on, isn’t it, kids? What number, then?”

“What a coincidence,” Bernie said. “I’m in number 29 - or I will be, if my landlady likes the look of my face.”

Raf nodded, reaching for her suitcase. “Aye, they can be muckle picky, although they’ve no right, really, with the war on and all. Do y’ mind? I’ll carry your suitcase.”

 

 

The car was ancient, Bernie realised, once they’d got the children loaded in the back. Raf apologised for the noise of the engine, shouting to be heard. “It’s the petrol we get, you know. It’s no’ the real thing; I’m sure they cut it with something.” 

“Probably,” Bernie shouted back. “I wouldn’t put it past the brass!” 

Raf laughed, the lines of worry on his face dissipating for an instant. “What do you do, then?” he asked when they were stopped at a traffic light. “What brings you to Clydebank?”

Bernie sighed. “I’m meant to be starting a job at Clydebank hospital tomorrow,” she said. “In the trauma unit. Should be interesting, but, well.”

Raf glanced at her. “In the trauma unit, really?” 

“Yes. I can’t see why a tiny place like this would need a trauma unit, but that’s where I’ve been posted, so that’s where I’ll go,” Bernie said. “Why?” 

“Only, that’s where I work,” Raf said. 

Bernie slapped a hand over her mouth. “Oh - I didn’t mean - I’m so sorry!” she said. 

Raf grinned. “It’s no’ a lie, though,” he said. “Clydebank is tiny, but I’m sure you’ll see why we need a trauma unit tomorrow. Ever been to Clydebank before?” 

Bernie grimaced, pushing her blonde fringe out of the way with one hand. “Aye,” she said, and allowed her own accent to creep into her voice. “I was born here.”

A good thing they were stopped at another traffic light, Bernie thought, for Raf’s foot jerked on the brakes and they moved for a couple of seconds before he remembered to put his foot back down. In the silence Bernie gazed at the tall sandstone tenements that lined both sides of the road, teeming with people, washing hung over balconies on every floor. 

“Bernie,” Raf said, letting the car roll forward slightly. “Bernie Wolfe? You’re no’ Berenice Wolfe, are you?”

“That’s me,” Bernie said, reverting back to her clipped, English accent. 

“Jesus,” he said forcefully, turning to glare at her. “My parents knew your parents. They were devastated when you left, you know that?”

Bernie winced, slightly, schooling her face back into composure quickly. “I’d no idea that was what they were saying. But… your parents?” 

“Aye,” Raf said. “The di Luccas. We lived a couple of buildings up from you on the Dumbarton Road. I must’ve been, what, a couple of years behind you at school.”

“I had no idea you were still here!” Bernie said, and Raf laughed, a wry, bitter sound. 

“Not all of us get scholarships to Cambridge medical school, you know,” he said. “No, I had to be the good son, stay a’ home. My medical degree’s from Glasgow, and I did it part time over six, seven years.”

“I’m… sorry?” Bernie said, twisting her hands in her lap, the rough feeling of her tweed skirt a reminder that it was now, 1941, not the late 1920s of her adolescence.

“No,” Raf said, waving a hand dismissively. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be so bitter. I was jealous of you for a few years though, I’ll tell you that.”

Bernie’s mouth twisted in a semblance of a smile. “You shouldn’t be. You’ve no idea how hard it is to get jobs as a lady doctor.”

“Surely the war’s helping with that,” Raf said.

“I wouldn’t know,” Bernie said, shrugging. “I haven’t been involved in the civilian medical world for some years.”

Raf’s eyebrows rose, expressive and heavy on his slight face, and Bernie prepared herself for a barrage of questions - but thank God, here was Kilbowie Road, and Raf pulled over to the side. Kilbowie Road was another line of sandstone tenements, and there was a group of small children playing hop with a scrap of chalk a little way up the road. Bernie stared at them (she had been a child just like that, once, all knobby knees and scraped elbows, _I don’t want t’ go to kirk, mama,_ a thousand times she’d taken her maths homework out of the house, going anywhere to escape her father’s rage and her mother’s penitent helpless grief) - but Raf was speaking, and Bernie pulled her mind back to 1941 with a colossal effort of will.

“What time’s your shift tomorrow?” he asked.

“Oh nine hundr-“ Bernie caught herself. “Nine am.”

Raf gazed at her, searchingly, and she forced herself not to look away, and then he nodded. 

“Aye, alright. Like a lift tomorrow morning?” he said. “You should buy a bicycle, and I’ve a friend who might be able to help with that, but in the meantime…”

Bernie smiled, reaching for her suitcase as she stepped out of the car. “I’d appreciate that, Raf; and thanks for the lift.” 

 

 

Bernie’s landlady’s flat was tiny but spotlessly tidy, with a noisy radiator churning out heat from one wall. Bernie was only ten minutes late for her appointment, and her landlady, Mrs McCaig, turned out to be a kind, motherly soul who exclaimed over how cold Bernie’s hands were, and promptly told her to sit down and have a cup of tea. 

“The flat is no’ big, you understand,” Mrs McCaig said, pouring tea into two cups, a little chipped but made of good porcelain. “Milk?” 

“Thanks,” Bernie said as she sat down on one of the two chairs around the kitchen table, smoothing her blazer self-consciously. 

“What will you be doing while you’re here?” Mrs McCaig asked as she took a glass flask of milk from the coolbox, pouring some gently into the cups before stirring.

“I’ve a job in the trauma unit at the hospital - thanks,” Bernie said, reaching for the proffered tea with a smile.

“Very good,” Mrs McCaig said. “You’re a nurse, then?” 

A hint of pride coloured Bernie’s voice. “No - a doctor.”

Mrs McCaig looked up from her saucer. “Oh, that’s wonderful!” she exclaimed, and Bernie blushed slightly at the praise. “My daughter wants to be a doctor,” Mrs McCaig continued in a warm voice, “but my husband - well. He thought it wasn’t quite the done thing, but she’s working in the Women’s Auxiliary Medical Corps now, so he can’t say a thing about it.”

Bernie rolled her eyes. “Men,” she said, and Mrs McCaig smiled, setting her cup and saucer down on the table.

“Ms Wolfe, I’d be delighted to let the flat to you. How would ten shillings a week sound?” 

Bernie started slightly: the rate was less than she’d anticipated. “That would be perfect,” she said.

Mrs McCaig stood up, turning to rummage through a chest of drawers behind the table. “I’ll give you the key, then,” she said, “and I’ll show you where it is.” She turned back, picking up Bernie’s suitcase as she walked to the door. Bernie stood up quickly, following her to the door. 

The flat was two floors up, and as they walked up the narrow stairs Mrs McCaig pointed out the other neighbours. “Mrs Malcolm lives there,” she said, pointing to one door that was slightly ajar. “Her husband is a POW, poor woman; she works at John Brown’s shipyard in their munitions department. This is Mrs Houston’s place; she works at the hospital too - you might get to know her. This is Mrs MacChruim’s apartment; her son suffers from asthma, very badly too, and he wasnae able to join the army.”

“How long have you all lived here?” Bernie asked, as they reached the second landing. 

“Ah, I’ve been here twenty years,” Mrs McCaig said genially, as she fished in her pocket for the key. “Most of us have been here for near as long. Kilbowie Road - well, Clydebank generally, if I’m being honest - most of us know each other, one way or another. You’ll be very welcome.”

“Thank you,” Bernie said, an odd note of gratitude in her voice. “I appreciate it, really I do.”  
  
Mrs McCaig threw the door of the flat open. “Here you are, then. Like I said, it’s no’ much, but it does the job. I’ll leave you to get settled in - if you need anything, don’t hesitate to ask.”

Bernie smiled, picking up her suitcase and walking into her new flat, closing the door gently behind her. Mrs McCaig hadn’t been lying: it was bare bones, walls covered in old vinyl wallpaper of a muted floral pattern, a bed tucked along one side of the room and a little kitchen huddling along the opposite wall. She opened a door leading off the main room: it led to a tiny bathroom. She was lucky to have her own bathroom, she realised; most of the flats in London had a communal water closet on each stairwell landing, and in the really dreadful flats you had to give yourself sponge baths or resign yourself to smelling. Still… she flopped down on the bed, not caring if her suit got crushed. The ceiling was lower than she expected, she thought, and she squinted up at the peeling paint which covered the support beams. She’d slept under a thousand ceilings like this, once, she thought; a thousand iterations of never quite enough, never quite escaping the awful drudgery of her childhood-

Bernie closed her eyes. She should never have taken this job, she thought. God damn the SOE brass who decided that, just because she’d been wounded, she was now useless, fit only to support the home effort. God damn the rogue bullet that had grazed her spine and killed her best friend; God damn the desperate mission to get her out of France that had followed the injury, and the months of recuperation back in London afterwards. Dimly Bernie thought she should probably go and buy some food - but her awareness dimmed and she drifted into a fitful sleep, haunted by memories of dark hair and blue eyes, illuminated by the lights of the Eiffel tower. 


	2. Vive Marianne!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bernie doesn't expect her first day at work to be quite as interesting as it is...

Bernie sat upright with a start, her skirt tangled around her legs. Dim light filtered through the half-drawn curtains, and she checked her watch, heart racing. Oh eight hundred hours and - she rolled off the bed in a panic - she was due to meet Raf in a quarter of an hour. She staggered slightly as she stood up, pins and needles shooting through her legs, but she reached for her suitcase, thumbing open the locks and throwing it open. Skirt - yes, fine; shirt - crumpled will have to do; stockings - where was her other pair, dammit, _dammit,_ ahh, found them, alright. She pulled her clothes off roughly, cringing as her back spasmed when she shrugged her new shirt on.

Five minutes later Bernie was racing down the stairs, satchel in hand as she ran a hand through her hair, attempting to comb down the unruly curls. She opened the heavy door to the street, expecting to see Raf already waiting, tapping his foot impatiently as he leaned against his car. Instead, Raf was in the process of driving up, turning the car in the middle of the street so he could drive off in the direction of the hospital.

“Hello then,” he called, pushing the passenger’s door open as Bernie raced over. 

Bernie dumped her satchel at her feet. “Thanks for the lift,” she said breathlessly. 

“Ach, it’s no problem,” Raf said, glancing at her as he sped off. “You got enough sleep last night, then?” 

“Nowhere near,” Bernie said, twisting her face in a grimace. “No breakfast, neither.”

Raf barked out a laugh. “There’s a cafe near the hospital. If I hurry you could grab a bite before the shift starts. Ms Campbell brooks no sleepy eyes on her ward.” 

Bernie frowned. “Ms Campbell?”

“Aye,” Raf said, nodding vigorously. “Serena Campbell. She runs the trauma ward, so you’ll be working under her.”

“What’s she like, then?” Bernie asked, and Raf grinned, shooting her a sideways glance as he drove

“You’ll meet her soon enough,” he said, and no matter how much Bernie pestered him, he refused to say more.

 

 

The ward, when Bernie walked in, mug of coffee in hand, was small, evidently under-funded. The nurses’ station was nothing more than a bench, behind which a lone chair stood, piled high with folders and documents.One stethoscope lay draped across the bench, in danger of falling onto the floor, and Bernie stepped closer, twitching it with two fingers to lay more securely on the bench. Elsewhere, the walls were covered in the light-green wallpaper typical of hospitals everywhere, two chalkboards covering one wall with lists of beds and surnames. But the nurses were clad in meticulously-clean white uniforms, seeming focused and well-trained, and Bernie’s raised eyebrow lowered. Maybe this Serena Campbell really was as good as Raf seemed to think. 

“Ms Berenice Wolfe?” The voice was warm and low; friendly. Bernie turned around, meeting the eyes of a woman in a blue skirt suit, her dark hair hinting at the true Scottish auburn.

“That’s me,” Bernie said, sticking out a hand before realising she’d proffered the hand holding her satchel. She quickly swapped them around, blushing fiercely as the woman smiled, the skin under her eyes crinkling. 

“I'm Serena Campbell,” the woman said as they shook hands. “I hear you’re our new trauma surgeon.”

Bernie nodded, mumbling in the affirmative.

“We’ll have lots of work for you,” Serena said, leading them to an office tucked away in one corner of the ward. 

“That’s something I don’t understand,” Bernie said as they reached the office. It was meticulously neat - like Serena herself, Bernie realised - one wall covered in bookshelves stacked high with medical texts and journals. “Why the need for a trauma unit here?”

Serena leaned sideways against the desk, hooking one leg on top of the desk and leaning on it. Bernie stood ramrod straight just inside the doorway as she gazed at Serena, unable to look away.

“Several reasons,” Serena said, and Bernie’s eyes flicked upwards to meet Serena’s. “There’s several important factories around Clydebank: Singer’s, John Brown Shipyards, among others. They used to produce civilian goods; now, they produce exclusively military materials. They’re too important to allow any factory accidents to slow production. Hence, the trauma unit here.” 

Bernie nodded, Serena’s low voice washing over her, calming and reassuring her.

“Second,” Serena continued, “There’s a big army training centre just north of Glasgow. They send anyone injured in training to us. Third, if anywhere in Scotland were to be bombed by the Luftwaffe, it would likely be Glasgow. Should that happen, we need to be trained and ready to respond.” 

Bernie fought to keep a poker face. How did Serena know about the army centre? As far as Bernie knew, that centre was SOE, not the regular army, and civilians should have no idea of its existence. But Serena was still talking. 

“You’re from London, aren’t you?” 

Bernie shook her head, before thinking better of it and turning it into a nod. One of Serena’s eyebrows twitched upwards, and Bernie shrugged, minutely.

“As far as any of us can make out, London’s been bombed heavily by Jerry in the last few months. I have it on good authority that Westminster is concerned the same might happen in Scotland.”

“How do you - ” Bernie started, and Serena winked. 

“Can’t tell you,” she said, a small grin tugging her lips upwards. “But they are, and if Jerry comes to Glasgow, we’re the first medical line of defence.” 

Bernie stared outright, shoving her hands in her skirt pockets as Serena gazed back from her perch on her desk. The silence stretched, elastic, between them, and Bernie was the first to break it, glancing away before she spilled her thoughts. When she glanced back, Serena was staring down at a sheaf of papers in her hands. 

“This is all the information you should need,” Serena said, handing the papers to Bernie. “We get a lot of accidents here, unusual cases which need to be operated on immediately, so you should be ready to operate at any point throughout your shift. We’ll get you some scrubs in a few moments.”

Bernie was flicking through the notes. “Is there an emergency department at this hospital,” she said, “or do we deal with all emergencies?”

Serena shrugged. “We deal with the most urgent and the most life-threatening. If we’re over capacity, other emergency cases go to Keller ward, but we will try to deal with all cases ourselves.”

Bernie nodded again. “Sounds reasonable,” she said. “I’m sure I’ll enjoy myself.”

Serena laughed slightly, as she extended a hand towards Bernie. Bernie took it, needing a couple of seconds before she realised Serena was giving her something: a small, square radio with a hook on the back.

“Take this,” Serena said. “Clip it to your belt, and if there’s an emergency we’ll call you from the transceiver at the nurses’ station. It’s like a ‘phone, but portable.”

Bernie turned the small grey box over in her hands. It had small holes cut in one side, obviously to accommodate a speaker, and a minute button on the top - to return speech, she assumed. A metal hook was embedded in another side, and she prised it away from the box’s body, slipping it over her skirt belt. 

“All set and ready to go, ma’am,” she told Serena in a lilting tone, and Serena grinned openly, giving Bernie a small salute. 

“I think you’ll enjoy it here,” Serena said, and slid off the desk in a single, efficient movement.

Bernie smiled - and then the door of the office opened and Raf burst in

“Ms Campbell - Ms Wolfe,” he said. “We’ve just had a call on the red phone.”

Serena launched into action. In all her time with the SOE, Bernie later thought, she’d never seen someone move so smoothly, or so rapidly: Serena would have been an asset to any fighting organisation. It was like shifting gears, in a car. Most civilians, in Bernie’s experience, took a few minutes to move their brain from normality to crisis; in the meantime they went through confusion, into fear, and then landed in panic. But Serena gave no indication that she might panic, now or at any other time. Instead, her movements quickened as she walked out of the office, and she took in the state of the ward in a single, decisive sweep, but her breathing remained steady and her voice firm as she asked Raf about the call. 

“It’s a factor worker,”Raf said, walking rapidly beside Serena as she swept out of the office, Bernie trailing behind. “Badly injured in an accidental explosion at Singer’s. Heavy bleeding, according to the caller.” 

“Did you manage to get any information about the actual injuries?” Serena said as she tapped a nurse with dark, curly hair on the shoulder. “We’ll need operating room one, please. Trauma call coming in.”

The nurse nodded and sped off, and Raf continued. “No, I’m sorry. The caller seemed pretty badly shaken, and they’re ten minutes away if that.” 

“Right then,” Serena said. “Scrub in, and I’ll meet you in operating one.” 

Raf nodded, barely sparing a glance for Bernie as he left. 

“Feel like jumping in at the deep end, Ms Wolfe?” Serena asked, turning to Bernie with a gleam in her eye.

“I’d love to, Ms Campbell,” Bernie replied, and surely she was imagining the excitement that suddenly permeated the air.

 

 

The factory worker turned out to be a woman in her twenties who had been working on anti-tank mine fuses. One of the fuses had exploded, setting off the other fuses in the tray. Luckily, the girl, Mary, had been the only worker near the tray at the time, but shrapnel from the metal tray had embedded itself in her arms, chest, neck and face, causing heavy bleeding. 

“Blood pressure falling!” Raf said urgently, as they manoeuvred Mary onto the operating table. 

Bernie shot a glance at the heart rate monitor. “Heart rate critical!”

“Heavy internal bleeding,” Serena said, efficiently cutting through Mary’s blood-soaked clothes and cracking her chest.

Suddenly Mary’s readings dropped precipitously, and a loud beeping filled the room. Raf glanced at the monitors, bloodied hands held away from his body. 

“I don’t think we can get her back,” he said, looking for confirmation towards Serena. 

Bernie glanced up from Mary’s chest. “Scalpel,” she said, one hand extended, and a scalpel was placed in her open palm. “Yes we can.”

Serena moved to stand beside Bernie, placing a hand over Bernie’s. “I don’t think we can,” she said quietly. “We need to call time of death.” 

“Not yet!” Bernie said, eyes fixed on Mary’s heart, which she was holding in one hand as she commenced cardiac massage. “Defibrillator! And we need to fix that internal bleeding!” 

Nobody moved, for several long seconds, and then Bernie glanced at Raf, nearest the defibrillator. “I said defibrillator!” she roared, and her long-buried Glaswegian accent came to the fore. “Now!” 

Bernie felt, rather than heard, Serena take a small hiccup of breath beside her, and Raf jumped to grab the defibrillator. 

“Three, two, one,” Bernie counted, and placed the heart back in its place. “Now,” she said, and Raf pushed the defibrillator buttons. 

The beeping continued. 

“Now,” Bernie said again, and Raf repeated his action.

The beeping stopped. The room was filled with silence. 

And then Serena jumped into action, calling, “Internal bleeding, fix it now!” and as she reached for a pair of tweezers, Bernie realised that she missed the warmth Serena had radiated against her side.

 

 

After the surgery was finished, Mary had been sent up to the intensive care department, still sedated but with a less immediate risk of dying. Raf had clapped Bernie on the back once he’d taken off his gloves and washed his hands, the grin on his face proof that he was impressed, even though he’d never say anything out loud. Bernie had delayed taking off her apron and cap for some long minutes, instead standing in the middle of the now-empty operating room, deep in thought.

“Ms Wolfe,” Serena’s voice rang out, loud in the silence of the operating room, and Bernie jumped, turning around quickly. 

“Ms Campbell,” she said, pulling off her cap and shaking out her hair. 

“What you did today was brave, but I can’t allow you to do it again.”

Bernie gaped. “I saved that girl’s life!” 

Serena shrugged, quietly closing the operating room door, but continuing to speak loudly. “Unfortunately if a patient experiences a precipitous failure like Mary did, hospital wartime policy is that it should be declared as time of death.”

“But that’s ridiculous,” Bernie said heatedly. “I knew I was able to save her, and I did.” 

Bernie watched, open-mouthed, as Serena walked slowly, purposefully, towards her. 

“Ms Wolfe,” Serena said, almost too low to be heard. “I know you’re originally from Clydebank; I know you were posted overseas.”

Bernie jerked backwards, a full-body, visceral movement. “You can’t know that.” She shook her head as if to deny the evidence of her ears.

“But I do,” Serena said. “I know the state of medicine in the field is barbaric; utterly awful, and I understand your need to save as many lives as you can.”

“You don’t know a damn thing,” Bernie said viciously.

“Hush!” Serena said, placing a finger against Bernie’s lips. “I know more than you think.” 

Bernie felt slightly cross-eyed as she tried to see Serena’s blunt fingernail. She opened her mouth to speak, and Serena snatched her finger away. 

“You haven’t seen what the Germans are doing, Ms Campbell,” Bernie said, voice dark as she thrust her hands into her pockets. Serena had backed her against one of the racks of medical tools, well out of the line of sight of the door, and somewhere in the back of her mind Bernie was impressed. “You weren’t there at the fall of Paris. You haven’t met the _vichyste_ collaborators, seen _les étoiles des David_ on peoples’ coats appear overnight. You haven’t experienced how vicious, how mercenary, people can be, how they’ll shaft anyone for an extra piece of bread.” 

Bernie realised with horror that she was close to tears, and she glanced upwards, towards the ceiling, in an attempt to forestall the sobs she could feel approaching. When she glanced back towards Serena she realised that Serena had rolled up one sleeve: on the underside of her wrist was inked a tiny nautical star. Bernie’s eyes widened, and she clasped Serena’s wrist with the tips of her fingers. Serena edged microscopically closer

“I was part of the Resistance in Paris, in the early days of the Occupation,” she said, eyes fixed on her tattoo. “I’d lived there for a decade with my husband, and who would suspect an expat doctor of being part of _la Résistance?_ I had this inked the day after I arrived back in London, after Paris fell. It was the symbol of my Resistance cell.” Serena’s eyes closed, and she swayed, suddenly, unsteady on her feet. “God - I’ve been dying to tell somebody.” 

Bernie felt unable to look away from the tattoo, her thumb tracing its many points over and over again. Serena stood in front of her as if glued to the floor, free hand bracing herself against a nearby tray of tools. Bernie could feel Serena’s pulse, strong and jumpy, rushing through her veins.

“How did you know I was posted overseas, though?” she asked as the thought occurred to her suddenly, and Serena’s eyes shot open. 

“You’re SOE,” Serena said, and Bernie restrained her instinctual nod of confirmation. “So was I.”

Bernie stared, and Serena held her gaze for several long moments before Bernie realised she was still holding Serena’s wrist in her hands. She let it go, and it was obvious that Serena hadn’t been expecting it, because her hand dropped, grazing Bernie’s chest slightly before Serena exerted control over her muscles.

“What does this mean?” Bernie asked. “This can’t possibly be mere coincidence.” 

Serena shrugged, expressive and - now Bernie could look for it - very French. “You thought you were invalided out of the SOE, didn’t you?” 

Bernie nodded, hands twisting together in front of her.

Serena tilted her head, slow, her gaze steady and direct. “I wouldn’t be so certain, if I were you. The SOE may have use of you yet.” 

Bernie was speechless, staring at Serena as she smiled, a private, conspiratorial smile, patting Bernie’s arm briefly as she turned to go, buttoning her sleeve with her other hand. 

At the door, Serena turned around. “This conversation didn’t happen, alright?” 

“Of course not,” Bernie replied, and Serena smiled again.

“Good,” she said. “We can debrief the surgery later, then.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Little nautical star tattoos were sometimes used as lesbian symbols. Serena’s has a very deliberate double meaning!  
> The SOE were the British spy outfit that Nancy Wake worked for. Nancy trained at the SOE camp in the north of Scotland during 1943(I think, don’t quote me). It’s my head canon that this camp is the one discussed in this chapter, just outside of Glasgow.  
> My medical history is shit, so if you know anything about surgical procedures in the 1940s, please let me know??  
> If you’ve read chapter 1 of my other story There’s A Crack In Everything you might be aware that public attitudes to homosexuality in Scotland were very much Not Good right up until the last twenty, thirty years or so. Those attitudes inform my portrayal of these characters, and they inform the choices they made (Bernie leaving to go to England/Serena going to France.)  
> Finally, I’d like to give a shout out to the truly remarkable story Engrave Our Names On Tomorrow by Needled_Ink_1975. This story wasn’t directly inspired by it but my god, even if you’re not in the Mirandy fandom, give it a read. Its portrayal of the Resistance in France and the German retreat is just stunning.


	3. Major Berenice Wolfe of the Special Operations Executive

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bernie uses her status to get Serena's attention; Serena's attention is very definitely got. Near-failures of self control ensue.

The rest of the week fell into the pattern of hospitals everywhere. Bernie bought a bicycle for a few pounds off Raf’s friend, and began cycling to the hospital every morning. Then she developed a habit of meeting Serena before work in Pulses, the hospital cafe. A few days later Serena paid for Bernie’s coffee as well as her own after Bernie, still half-asleep, had been unable to find a pound note in the depths of her bag. Since then they had alternated paying for each other’s coffee before walking up to the trauma ward together. They didn’t talk much about their experiences overseas: Serena’s comments in the operating room seemed to be a one-off, born of stress and an exhausting surgery more than anything else. 

They did, however, discuss nearly everything else: planned surgeries, impromptu surgeries, concerts they had been to in the past, concerts they might see after the war, the progress of the war…

“I’ve heard that our boys are preparing for an assault on Tobruk,” Serena said one day as they walked up to the ward. 

“Which corps is that?” Bernie asked, only half paying attention as she sipped from her mug of coffee, feeling the caffeine from the coffee/chicory mix seep into her bones. 

“The thirteenth,” Serena said, and Bernie’s attention snapped back to Serena.

“My nephew’s in that corps,” Bernie said faintly. “I should tell my sister.”

Serena turned, grasping Bernie by the forearm. “You can’t,” she said. 

Bernie paused. Narrowed her eyes, gazed at Serena’s earnest, urgent expression. Her shoulders sank, and she slouched forward a little. “No, you’re right. I can’t,” she said, glancing down at her coffee. “Will you find out how they get on though, please?"

Serena squeezed Bernie’s arm, solid and reassuring. “I’ll do my best, I promise,” she replied, and Bernie smiled back, a little, in response. 

 

 

Serena’s area of expertise, it turned out, was vascular surgery. Bernie was the only specialist trauma surgeon on the ward, and so she and Serena operated together more often than not, hands deep in the blood and viscera to which their profession was so accustomed. They developed a strong operating bond, able to signify which area they would tackle next with a raised eyebrow or a pointed look. 

“Scalpel, Ms Wolfe,” Serena would murmur, and one would land on her upraised palm within seconds. 

A few minutes later - “Forceps?” Bernie would ask, barely looking up from the tissue in front of her, and Serena would pass a pair over, turned the right way so Bernie could slide her fingers through the handles without a pause in her work. 

Cigarettes were scarce now, because of the rationing, but Bernie still smoked occasionally, and always after surgery. Serena would often join her, standing in their scrubs on the roof of the hospital, looking out across the Clydebank rooftops towards the glimmering route of the Clyde River to the south, and towards Glasgow in the east. The chimneys of Clydebank were constantly chugging out industrial smoke, coating the entire town in an eerie haze: in a twist of Papist humour, Clydebank’s nickname the _Holy City_ referred to the thick, black smoke pumped out from the Sistine Chapel once a new Pope had been chosen. Clydebank, so staunchly Protestant, with the staunchly Papist nickname. Nevertheless the winter past had been unusually kind to Glasgow, and even in the early evening it was sometimes warm when Bernie and Serena would finish surgery and make their way up to the rooftops, Bernie digging out her lighter from her pockets. Sometimes Serena would pass Bernie a little packet of cigarettes, obtained from god knows where, and Bernie would grin, lopsided as she pulled one out and stuck it between her teeth, carefully refolding the wax paper packet and putting it in a pocket. Sometimes, after particularly difficult surgeries, Serena would wordlessly hold a hand out for a cigarette herself, and Bernie would pull two out, lighting them both before handing one to Serena. But they always had the roof to themselves, standing grounded and sure-footed amongst the fans and air outlets.

 

 

One grey day in early February a young man was rushed in from the army camp outside Glasgow, badly burned from a bomb which had accidentally exploded during training. After the surgery was finished and Serena and Bernie had done their best to patch up the lad, Serena raged at the Captains who had brought him in, arguing that he should have been taken directly to Glasgow General and Trauma, instead of coming the long way around to Clydebank. The officers - who had spent the hours the man had been in surgery standing rigidly in the waiting room - stared at Serena for several long seconds as if unsure how to reply, before one of them stepped forwards, grasping Serena by the upper arm and steering her into her own office. Bernie was walking past the office, operating cap in hand as she wondered whether she could feasibly take a break - and if so, where was Serena - when she noticed that the door to Serena’s office was closed. Bernie peered through a gap in the blinds, trying not to look like she was spying, and saw Serena leaning back against her desk, unusually stiff, the officer pacing before her. Bernie frowned.

“You know damn well why we couldn’t take him to Glasgow General,” the officer said in a distinctly upper-crust English accent, moustache quivering in poorly-controlled anger. “You’re not paid to ask questions, Mrs Campbell. That was never part of the deal.” 

Bernie nearly smacked her nose on the glass, unprepared for the sudden wash of rage she felt. Nobody talked to Serena like that. Nobody. Through the crack in the blinds, Bernie saw Serena’s fingers flex around the edge of the desk, and Bernie grinned slightly, preparing herself for Serena’s onslaught of righteous fury. But…

Silence.

Serena bowed her head, fingers trembling.

Bernie stared. 

The officer turned, one hand stuffed in his jacket like the jumped-up little Napoleon he was trying to be. “I’m glad we’ve had this chat, Mrs Campbell,” he said, and paced towards the door.

Bernie moved, faster than a Spitfire as she dashed to the door, opening it a second before the officer reached it. A little shorter than she, he had to look up to glare at her, and she grinned mirthlessly at him as she walked inside, shutting the door as she moved to stand beside Serena. Serena glanced up at her, eyes dark under her eyelashes, and Bernie was surprised by the depth of her frown.

“Who are you?” the officer said, eyeing her up and down. 

“Major Berenice Wolfe of the Special Operations Executive,” she said, omitting a salute as she let her original Scottish accent out loud and strong. “And who are you, soldier?”

She had the pleasure of watching the officer’s face flush, bright red with rage, as he was forced to salute her, a superior officer.

“Lieutenant Cumberland, ma’am,” he said. “From the Bellahouston camp.”

“Aye,” Bernie said. “I don’t know what you and Ms Campbell were discussing, Cumberland, and I don’t need to know. All I need is for you to apologise to Ms Campbell for the abominable way you’ve treated her, and then leave.”

Bernie felt, more than saw, a flash of movement beside her, as Serena’s head jerked up and she stared at Bernie. Bernie moved her hand, just slightly, and her fingers brushed Serena’s in a gesture of reassurance. Cumberland hesitated, eyes rapidly shifting between Bernie and Serena, and Bernie snapped. 

“Apologise!” she roared, her voice echoing around the small office as it had once rang out across the boulevards of Paris, and Cumberland leaped to attention, body moving before his brain had fully caught up.

“I do apologise, Mrs Campbell, for speaking so roughly,” Cumberland said, voice strangled and eyes on Bernie, and Bernie considered it for several seconds.

“It’ll do,” she said, dismissing him with a brief wave of her hand. “Now go.”

As soon as he was out of the room Serena turned towards Bernie, grabbing her by the bicep, fingers taut around muscle.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” Serena said, in a low voice, and Bernie reached out and held on, tight, to Serena’s other arm.

“Nobody speaks to you like that,” Bernie argued. Serena smiled, and Bernie gazed at her, mesmerised by the slow stretch of her reddened lips. 

“I can’t tell you what’s going on,” Serena said, thumb sweeping unconsciously along the inside of Bernie’s arm. “But… thank you.” 

Bernie grinned, ducking her head a little to catch Serena’s gaze. “Any time.” 

Serena paused, eyes flicking down to where her hand was wrapped around Bernie’s upper arm. Bernie felt Serena’s fingers twitch, just slightly, and she realised that she was holding her breath, hyper-aware of her own arm. 

The door crashed open and Serena jumped away, her eyes still locked on Bernie. Raf was shouting about the red phone, loud but oddly indistinct in Bernie’s ears. 

“Come for dinner tonight?” Serena asked softly. Bernie thought that, despite Raf’s noise, it might be the only thing she could hear clearly. 

“Of course,” Bernie said, and reached out to clasp Serena’s arm again, before turning to Raf.

 

 

 

Serena’s area was considerably nicer than Bernie’s, she thought ruefully much later, as Serena and Bernie cycled up Serena’s street. It turned out to be one of the few tree-lined streets in Clydebank, and instead of the sandstone terraces which formed the majority of Clydebank’s residential areas, Serena’s street was full of Georgian-era houses, now broken up into apartments. It was lovely, Bernie thought, and inwardly she wished she’d done a little more research into Clydebank’s housing before she moved from London. 

Likewise, Serena’s apartment was considerably nicer than Bernie’s: warm and welcoming, well-lit and exuding a comfortable, generous atmosphere: rather like the woman herself, Bernie thought. It wasn’t much bigger than Bernie’s own bare-bones apartment, but she felt instantly at home when she walked in.

“Aunty Serena!” a voice called from further within the apartment, and Bernie turned to Serena, one eyebrow raised. 

“My nephew,” Serena explained. “Hullo Jason!”

Jason appeared at the end of the hallway: tall, a little stooped, wearing an oven mitt on his right hand. 

“I didn’t think you’d be home until later,” Serena said, unwrapping her scarf. “This is Bernie, who works with me.” 

Jason frowned. “I work late on Tuesdays and Fridays, unless there’s an emergency, Aunty Serena. Today’s Wednesday, so I made potatoes and beans like we agreed. Are you Dr Bernie?” he asked, glancing at Bernie, who felt as though she was being instantly summed up, analysed and broken down into her constituent parts before being reassembled.

“That’s me,” she said cheerfully. 

“Aunty Serena’s told me a lot about you,” Jason replied, and out the corner of her eye Bernie caught a glimpse of Serena’s hands, twisting around the strap of her bag.

“All good, I hope,” Bernie said, grinning slyly at Serena.

“Most of it was very good,” Jason said, nodding. “Do you like comic books, Dr Bernie?”

“I do, actually,” Bernie said, putting her satchel down and taking her coat off. “When I lived in London lots of people used to queue up outside the stationers’ in order to buy them when the new issues came out.”

Bernie felt a tug at the back of her neck, and realised that Serena was holding her coat by its collar. She shrugged it off as Jason replied, and Serena looped it over the coat stand next to her own coat.

As Jason had said, dinner was mince, potatoes and green beans. Like all meals in Scotland now, it was basic, but hearty: the rationing system imposed by the German blockade of the British Isles left little room for cordon bleu. Nevertheless, Serena offered Bernie a tiny, precious glass of red wine. 

“How do you get these things!” Bernie asked, inhaling the well-remembered scent. “I thought we were under rationing!” 

Serena paused, winked as she handed Bernie her glass, and turned away with a sly grin. “It’s a smaller glass than I’d usually drink, I’ll tell you that.”

“What do you do, Jason?” Bernie asked, once they had sat down and said prayers. 

“It’s top secret,” Jason said, looking over his glasses at her as he speared a potato. “I’m not meant to say.”

Bernie’s eyes widened, and she looked over at Serena, who was gazing back at her appraisingly. There was a pause, and then - 

“You can trust her, Jason,” Serena said, an odd light in her eyes.

“Are you sure?” Jason asked.

“I’m sure,” Serena said, and Bernie’s heart thumped strangely in her chest as she realised she was smiling, wide and joyful, at Serena.

“Okay,” Jason said, turning to Bernie. “I’m a code-cracker, with the army."

"Wow," Bernie said. "That's important work." 

“Vital, actually,” Serena said, and Bernie glanced over to see her beaming with pride at Jason. 

“Thanks,” Jason said, grinning at Serena before he turned to Bernie. “I’m good with patterns and numbers, and so when I couldn’t join the army because of my eyesight, they suggested I work with the code-breakers up here, in Glasgow.”

“We used codes a lot, in the SOE,” Bernie said. “It was important to be able to get information out of France without being intercepted by Jerry.” 

“Aunty Serena told me about you being in France,” Jason said, and Bernie raised one eyebrow, glancing at Serena, who suddenly seemed very interested in her last green bean. 

“Didn't know you were that interested,” Bernie said in a low voice to Serena. 

“Aunty Serena is very interested,” Jason replied, matter-of-fact, and Bernie burst into laughter at the sight of Serena’s blush.

 

 

They finished dinner relatively early, in time for Bernie to cycle back to her apartment on the Kilbowie Road. The sky was nearly dark; a velvety Prussian blue which Bernie was aware would fade to black in the next twenty minutes. The inhabitants of the Georgian flats across the road had already pulled their black-out curtains across their windows, and all the streetlights were out. Bernie’s bicycle had a tiny, low-powered torch which pointed downwards towards the road, and she flicked it on, releasing a wash of golden light to shake across the cement of Serena’s path as she walked the bicycle towards Serena’s gate, propping it up. Serena pulled the front door closed, and came to join her at the gate, hands shoved deep in the pockets of her coat. Bernie paused at the front gate, one hand on the seat of her bicycle. 

“Thanks for coming tonight,” Serena said quietly, and Bernie moved closer so Serena wouldn’t have to talk too loud, wouldn’t have to risk the ever-present threat of German surveillance. Serena smelt musky and warm, Bernie thought, as she caught a faint scent of cinnamon and the red wine they’d both drunk. In the darkness Serena swayed closer, and Bernie caught a glimpse of her eyes, shining in the diffuse light of Bernie’s torch. 

“I enjoyed myself,” Bernie said, uncharacteristically shaky, and she felt, more than she saw, Serena’s smile. 

The pause dragged on for a long time, as Serena seemed content to stand, hands deep in her pockets, a hair’s breadth of distance separating her from Bernie. The gap between them felt simultaneously too much and not enough, and Bernie’s nerves were on edge as Serena's eyes raked over her, stripping her down - for the second time this night - to her constituent parts. But this time Bernie didn’t feel examined, analysed, like she had with Jason; Serena’s eyes on her was an all-together different sensation: warm, appreciative, speculative - 

and Bernie realised that she’d let go of the bicycle and taken a single step forward, so close to Serena that their shoe-clad toes were touching. Serena pulled her hands out of her pockets as she gazed at Bernie, eyes wide and heated with some unknown feeling, and Bernie felt the heat of her hands through her coat as Serena pulled her closer by the elbows… And then Serena wrapped her arms around her, one hand on the small of her back and one higher up, by her shoulder-blades, and Bernie tried hard not to feel irrationally disappointed, but then Serena’s warmth was soaking through her and they were pressed tightly together, chest to chest, belly to belly, thigh to thigh and Bernie thought she might have come home at last. 

They were almost of equal heights, and so Bernie laid her head on Serena’s shoulder, very carefully. It must have been the right thing to do because Serena shuddered out a quick breath and laid her own head on Bernie’s shoulder, lips grazing Bernie’s neck in a brief streak of heat that Bernie felt down to her very soul. Bernie felt the persistent thump of Serena’s heartbeat as if it echoed in her own chest, two pumping hearts giving her life, and when she gasped in air Serena mirrored her action and they moved against each other, searching and desperate for something Bernie couldn’t quite yet discover-

“Oh,” Serena sighed, breath gusting warm against Bernie’s neck, and suddenly the moment was broken.

Bernie pulled away from Serena’s embrace, not quite daring to meet her eyes. She missed Serena’s heat immediately, but turned resolutely aside, fiddling awkwardly with her bicycle. 

“I’ll see you in the morning, then,” she said, and met Serena's eyes with a supreme force of will. They were blown wide, darker than she’d ever seen them, and Bernie’s breath hitched, desperate to see that look again soon.

Serena coughed, low in the back of her throat. “Alright,” she said, and smiled slightly as she held the gate open for Bernie. “See you tomorrow.” 

The look in Serena’s eyes haunted Bernie as she cycled away, and she shook her head, viciously, to clear away the image. But it didn’t vanish, couldn’t vanish: instead, she spent the night tossing on her narrow bed, tormented by the phantom sensation of Serena so close to her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Assault on Tobruk: the 13th British Army Corps were involved; it took place in late January 1941 I think.
> 
> Glasgow (most of GB) was under very strict rationing during 1941; it’s maaaaaassively unlikely Bernie and Serena would be able to get actual coffee; what they’re drinking here is only charitably called coffee. It would probably have been a chicory/acorns/roasted grain mix. It might also have included barley - and was probably as disgusting as it sounds.
> 
> Major outranks Captain as per British Army regulations (fuck I adore writing ballbreaking!Bernie).
> 
> On 16th April 1746 the Duke of Cumberland squashed the Jacobite uprising in Scotland at the Battle of Culloden. Cumberland has been termed the “Butcher of Culloden.” Not particularly relevant here but it’s a good name for a Scot to hate!


	4. Jerry on the Clyde

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Germans come to Clydebank; Bernie tries to do something. Serena understands more than Bernie could ever anticipate.

_Trk-drk-trk-drk-trk_ came the noise from the east, and Bernie instinctively looked to the sky. She was caught in the open, cycling to the hospital to begin a mid-morning shift, and her mind became a voiceless, thoughtless blank as she leapt off her bicycle, pulling it with one hand onto the pavement as she ducked towards a hedge. She flattened herself against the hedge and looked upwards: _trk-drk-trk-drk_ the noise continued, as its source came into view. 

A German airplane! Long and sleek, with a dual-seater cockpit slung under a parasol wing. Probably a Henschel, then. Bernie squinted: one pilot, one bomber, sitting directly behind the pilot. They were flying low over the rooftops and she imagined, with a vicious surge of rage, that had she a pistol, she’d be able to shoot them down. But alas, kicked out of the SOE, she had given up her firearm, given it up before she ever reached English soil, and so her steady, calm aim perfected in battle would not help her fight the Jerry who had appeared, like a relentless, virulent plague in the skies over Clydebank.

Around her, the inhabitants of the Dumbarton Road stared, gazing up at the sky where they were standing. Bernie tried to call out to them; she tried to shout a warning to the dark-haired woman standing in a boiler suit near her, staring at the airplane as it passed, but no words came. She gasped, suddenly short of breath, and tried again. The words were all there, but they were stuck, crowding deep in her throat. She doubled over, heaving and shaking as she tried to reclaim her breath. Instead _trk-drk-trk-drk-trk_ the sound of the Henschel crawled its way into her mind, setting ablaze the order she’d recreated so painfully after her evacuation from Paris and scattering her thoughts completely, irretrievably.

The Henschel swung south, towards the Clyde, and Bernie’s heart missed a beat in panic as she remembered John Brown’s Shipyards, Singer’s factory and the Royal Ordnance Factory, all clustered together on the river. Surely the Germans couldn’t be thinking of targeting the factories - but it was logical, she thought; logical they’d want to castrate British war manufacturing. And what better way to do it than to wipe out the factories on the Clyde? Bernie clenched her hand around her bicycle handles as she swung back onto the seat and peddled towards the hospital.

Ten minutes later she was sitting in Serena’s chair in their office, sipping from a cup of strong coffee. Her breath had started to calm, and she leaned her elbows on her spread knees, holding her cup in front of her. God, she thought, mind still a little scattered. Who’d have thought Jerry would turn up here? Quiet, forgotten little place that Clydebank was. Part of the reason she’d hated it so much as a child was because it was so quiet, so forgotten; that and its archaic social mores had always seemed to conspire against her to cramp her, to prevent her from doing what she wanted. 

Alex had understood that, she thought suddenly, and she resisted the instinctive urge to tamp the thought down, to hide it away as something profane, unclean. Bernie drank a little more of the coffee, as she wondered why she’d thought of Alex now, after months of keeping those thoughts stifled, after months of keeping her memories hidden even from herself. The sound of the Henschel, she supposed; sounds are uniquely positioned to resurrect old memories, and, well - it was just Bernie’s luck that her memories of German warplanes over Paris brought with them memories of kissing a particular tall, dark-haired woman. Bernie closed her eyes, massaging her eyeballs in hopes of avoiding a migraine. The movement sparked flares of light behind her eyes, and she remembered New Year’s Eve in Paris, 1939: kissing Alex, out of sight from everyone else as the new year struck, the feeling of Alex’s soft skin under her own and the heat of her secret, hidden places - Bernie groaned, low and pained as the door swung silently open.

“Bernie?” Serena’s concerned voice jolted Bernie upright, and her eyes flew open. 

“I -” she started, and fell silent. Serena was standing just inside the lintel, dark hair haloed in the golden, early-morning light from the ward. Bernie thought stupidly that she looked like some kind of saviour angel, the kind in which the kirk had always discouraged belief.

“You’re early for your shift,” Serena said, coming further into the office. Maybe she caught sight of Bernie’s wide eyes, or maybe her uneven breath was audible in the quiet, but Serena let the door close and moved towards Bernie, reaching out with one tentative hand to grasp her shoulder. Bernie felt the physical contact like the windblast from a Spitfire, sweeping her up in its wake, and she leaned into Serena’s touch, closing her eyes. 

“You don’t look alright, Bernie,” Serena said, and Bernie shook her head. 

“The Henschel,” she mumbled, pointing upwards with one finger, and somehow Serena understood her meaning, wrapping her other hand around Bernie to hug her fiercely. 

"I saw it too,” Serena murmured, resting her chin on Bernie’s hair. “Do you want to talk about it?” 

Bernie shrugged. “I saw it turn south, did you see that?”

“Yes,” Serena said, stroking Bernie’s shoulder absentmindedly. “I wondered if it was heading for the factories by the Clyde.”

“Probably,” Bernie agreed, leaning infinitesimally closer to Serena, letting her warmth remind Bernie that it was 1941 in Scotland, not 1939 in Paris. “My dad worked at John Brown’s, did you know that?”

Serena’s chin tilted, on the top of Bernie’s head, and Bernie felt a puff of air as Serena exhaled. “He made reproduction antique furniture for the cruise liners,” Bernie continued. “He worked there, and my uncles and my grandfathers and their fathers. I thought I hated the place, but…” 

Bernie trailed off, and Serena’s arms tightened around her. “I thought I hated this entire town,” Bernie said softly, “but I could never let the Nazis destroy it, not without trying to do something. But I’m as goddamned helpless as everyone else here.”

The movement of Serena’s fingers stilled. “You might be able to do something.”

Bernie pulled away from Serena, both eyebrows raised. “How?” 

Serena pulled a piece of paper towards her on the desk beside Bernie, and reached for a pen. She wrote a phone number down and handed it to Bernie, saying, “Burn this when you're done. It’s a direct line to SOE headquarters.”

Bernie stared at the little scrap of paper, and then she looked up at Serena, who was still standing close, gazing at her with a worried expression. “Oh my God, thank you!” Bernie said, words tumbling from her mouth without a second thought, and she leaned forward and kissed Serena on the cheek, impulsively. Serena’s skin felt impossibly soft beneath her lips, and she leaned backwards quickly to see Serena staring at her, fingers reaching up to touch the place by her jaw where Bernie’s lips had brushed. Bernie paused, heartbeat pounding in her ears before Serena smiled, shaky but reassuring, and then Bernie brushed her fingers down Serena’s arm and left, scrap of paper clutched in her free hand.

 

 

“- but I want to help, sir,” Bernie said down the crackling phone line. 

“I don’t even want to know how you got this number!” replied the male voice on the other end.

Bernie sighed. “Sir, I _am_ Major Berenice Wolfe, formerly stationed in Paris. I was invalided out when I got shot but I am now completely recovered from that injury. Give me _something_ to do, please.”

The voice grew marginally warmer. “I remember you, Major Wolfe. You always were a feisty little thing.”

Bernie rolled her eyes. 

“Unfortunately,” the voice continued, “my orders are to tell you to remain in Clydebank for the foreseeable future.”

“Why? Sir,” Bernie added hastily.

“Can’t tell you. But you’re doing important work. And now, I’m afraid, I must go - goodbye, Major Wolfe.”

The phone clicked off, and Bernie slammed the receiver down heavily.

 

 

Later that day Bernie signed herself up for more shifts. Double shifts, several times a week. When the timetable manager asked her how she intended to cope, she shrugged and avoided the question, but when her shift finished late that evening she cycled home, packing a blanket, pillow and her other shirt into a bag before cycling back to the hospital in time to start her second shift.

When the second shift finished she stumbled back to the office she shared with Serena, and stripped out of her skirt, draping it over a chair before wrapping herself in the blanket and bunking down underneath her desk.

She woke up the next morning to Serena’s brown eyes staring down at her, the scent of their usual coffee/chicory sludge wafting throughout the office.

“I couldn’t find you outside this morning, so I bought you a cup anyway,” Serena said, lifting a cup in illustration. 

Bernie rubbed her eyes blearily, sitting upright. “Thanks,” and she held her hand out for the cup. The blanket had fallen away as she sat up, and her upper thigh was exposed, a pale expanse of skin to which Serena’s eyes seemed glued as she handed over the coffee. Bernie twitched the blanket over herself and Serena shook herself, just slightly, eyes refocusing on Bernie’s face before leaving so Bernie could dress herself.

The next day, and the day after that continued similarly. Bernie slept in the office more often than not, taking the weekend shift and the graveyard shift and any other shifts she could. Serena never mentioned it, and Bernie puzzled over that before wondering if maybe Serena didn’t care enough to bother mentioning it - but their friendship seemed strong in other ways, and eventually Bernie didn’t try to understand. But Serena always brought her a cup of coffee in the morning, waking her with quiet words and occasionally a light touch to the shoulder, which Bernie never attempted to question.

And then one day, a week later, Serena woke her up with her normal cup of coffee, but she refused to leave. At first Bernie thought Serena was preoccupied, distracted, but then she sat down on the floor beside Bernie with a sigh. Bernie glanced at her: Serena’s face was drawn with worry, and her answering gaze held only concern. 

“What’s been going on, Bernie?” Serena asked, leaning back on her hands, legs straight out in front of her, and Bernie knew she couldn’t avoid the question.

“Remember that phone number you gave me?” she asked, staring down at her coffee cup.

Serena frowned. “The one to… London?”

“That one, aye,” Bernie said, her accent coming through her exhaustion. “I phoned it.”

“And what happened?”

“The man on the other end basically thanked me very much, said he remembered me and that I was a ‘feisty wee thing’, and then he told me to go back to what I was doing.”

Serena’s eyes softened. “I… wasn’t expecting that,” she admitted.

“Me neither,” Bernie huffed out a quiet laugh. "But then I realised that… I don’t know. I can’t stand my flat. It’s too…”

Bernie trailed off, letting the silence of the room envelope them again.

Beside her, she felt Serena shift, inching closer. “When I…” Serena swallowed audibly. “When I was evacuated from Paris, I couldn’t bear being alone. I was stationed here fairly quickly after I came back and so I took as many shifts as possible. My husband… my husband thought I should be home more, but the flat seemed empty, even when he was home, and I couldn’t bear it.”

Bernie looked up at Serena and was surprised to see her brown eyes filled with tears.

“Before the Occupation,” Serena continued, “I was working at a hospital in the 16th arrondissement. It was a good area, one of the wealthiest, but everyone knew there would be another war in Europe and even before the Germans arrived, people were making plans, trying to find some opportunity for profit or survival. It scunnered me, Bernie, it was disgusting and venal and cowardly, and so I joined the Resistance. My husband was living in Edinburgh at the time, so he didn’t see what I became - but after I was evacuated, the feeling of an empty flat reminded me of the Gestapo, waiting, lurking, outside, and I was jumpy and volatile and angry.”

Bernie looked away from Serena’s face, shaken by the naked emotion she saw there, and she realised that Serena’s hand had found a place on her knee, steadying and reassuring her. She put a hand over Serena’s hand, feeling the prominent veins, the strong fingers and joints. Took a deep breath.

“When the Germans marched into Paris, it felt like the entire city died.” 

Serena turned her hand over, palm to the sky, and Bernie laced their fingers together.

“I was posted to Paris shortly before the war began. I lived in the 15th, across the Seine on the left bank,” Bernie continued, “solidly middle-class, but not like the super-wealthy of the 16th. We bore the brunt of the Vichyste collaborators, we were first to be rounded up, first to be treated like cattle in the Nazi war game. I was in a small Resistance cell: myself, Alex - a woman from Yorkshire, Henri from Marseilles and Marceau from Paris.” 

Bernie stared down at their intertwined fingers, and - maybe she was imagining it - but she fancied she felt Serena moving ever closer, shoulders pressed firmly together.

“Henri was captured by the Gestapo in June last year. We were sure he’d talk - they all do - but we waited and waited and heard nothing. Then we began to think maybe he hadn’t given us up; maybe he’d resisted Gestapo torture, and so we got back in contact with England and restarted our activities. But it was a trap.”

Bernie’s voice cracked, and she gazed at the ceiling, desperately hoping she wouldn’t cry.

“The Gestapo ambushed us. I was shot - bleeding out - and Alex was trying to stop the blood while she and Marceau returned fire. They killed Alex,” Bernie said, pulling her legs up, wrapping her arms around herself. “They shot her in front of me, Serena, and I… I never told her what she meant to me.”

Serena’s shoulder jerked, just slightly, and Bernie forced herself, with a great effort of will, to look at Serena. She expected Serena’s eyes to be clouded with horror, an instinctual retreat from truths too real to be easily borne, even in this era of manmade savageries, but her dark eyes held no horror, only grief and the worn experience of secondhand loss. She disentangled their fingers and wrapped one arm around Bernie’s shoulders instead. Somehow this disarmed Bernie the most, and she swiped at her eyes, only to find tears running down her cheeks, the terrible heat of the tears mirrored only by the warmth of Serena’s arm around her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW warning: description of a panic attack   
> Henri from Marseilles - small nod to Nancy Wake’s husband Henri Fiocca, who was from Marseilles and who was actually captured by the Gestapo a short time after Nancy escaped to Britain. He refused to betray her and died in German custody.   
> Marceau from Paris - small nod to Marcel Marceau, who was also heavily involved in the Resistance.   
> A short note about the portrayal of homosexuality in this era: I’m taking massive liberties. In suburban Scotland at this time Bernie probably wouldn’t admit to having fallen in love with Alex, even to Serena, whom she knows well. That being said, I need to move the plot somehow, so this is it.  
> I feel icky about killing off Alex (is it too reminiscent of Kill Your Gays? I don’t know) but it’s also not like it could/would never happen in an active war zone. It’s certainly a death in keeping with the era and setting. Sorry Alex :/


	5. Equals?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bernie can't work out why Serena would want her as co-leader of the AAU, but Serena knows. Bernie also can't work out why Serena would ask her to dinner...

Bernie knocked on the ornate oak door, glancing at her watch as she did so: eighteen hundred hours. She’d intended to leave early, go home to the apartment she hated to at least try to sleep, now that Serena had caught her out in the office, but no; a burst appendix had arrived just before she was due to leave, and then she’d been called up here - 

“Come in!” a deep, slightly accented voice emanated from the interior room, and Bernie pushed the door ajar and slipped inside. Hanssen, the hospital’s head, sat behind a desk which took up the entire back wall of the room, and he was - frowning at Serena? Bernie’s frown mirrored Hanssen’s, as Serena smiled beatifically back at Bernie. 

“Why am I here?” Bernie asked, dimly aware of her brusque tone.

“Good question, Ms Wolfe,” Hanssen said, a wry smile twisting his thin lips. “Ms Campbell asked you to be here, and she’s refused to speak until you arrived.”

Bernie turned, raised one eyebrow. “Serena?” 

“I know Ms Wolfe was officially assigned to the AAU as a trauma surgeon, intended to work and operate under my command,” Serena started, and Bernie looked away, shuttering her eyes and soul from the finality she detected in Serena’s tone. 

But Serena continued. “I have recently discovered that it would be… blind, in the extreme, to assume that Ms Wolfe’s skills extend only to the Hippocratic persuasion. Bernie-” and Bernie turned her head, extended her gaze to Serena only to find Serena gazing back, insistent and kind, “Bernie has demonstrated an intimate understanding of the challenges faced by this ward, peculiar to our wartime conditions. And apart from our nominal rank, there is… no denying that we are equals.” 

Bernie felt her jaw drop, lips sagging for a split second before she was able to control her face. If a bomb had gone off outside the office she wouldn’t have been able to tear her eyes from Serena’s, and she felt scoured, clean and pure, by Serena’s returned gaze. Hanssen’s reply faded into a sort of buzzing in Bernie’s ears, as her gaze remained locked in Serena’s intense eyes. And then - 

“Ms Wolfe?"

Bernie realised Hanssen had probably called her name before, and she wrenched her eyes away. “Sorry?”

Hanssen’s lips twitched upwards, just slightly, and he repeated his question. “Ms Campbell is suggesting you lead AAU together. What do you say?”

“I-” Bernie turned back to Serena, who was twisting her hands in front of her. Nervous? No. Anxious? Did - did Serena want to work with her this badly? Bernie sneaked a glance at Serena’s eyes, and unconsciously straightened her shoulders when she realised they held nothing but affection and… hope? “I’d love to, Mr Hanssen,” she finished, and Serena’s smile, delighted and full, made it all worthwhile.

Out in the corridor, when she and Serena were dismissed from Hanssen’s office, Bernie pulled Serena towards her by the elbow, gently but insistently, and whispered, “Why’d you do that?”

Serena looked up at her. “I meant what I said in there,” she said.

Bernie gaped, just slightly, mind replaying Serena’s words as a phantom voice. _There is no denying that we are equals._ “But… there must’ve been something else,” Bernie said, “some other reason.”

Serena shrugged, lips quirking upwards in a grin. “Honestly? I thought you could use the challenge. Thought you might appreciate the extra work to take your mind off things.”

Bernie’s fingers twitched around Serena’s elbow, mouth open, but no words were forthcoming and Serena burst out laughing.

“Jason’s away for the night,” Serena said once she’d quietened. “Come over for dinner.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, of course,” Serena said, and Bernie nodded, able to read the sincerity in her voice. 

 

 

Bernie slung her coat over Serena’s coatstand as soon as she’d walked in the door, unwrapping her scarf with an audible sigh of relief. The evenings were still cold, but cycling to Serena’s flat had worked up a sweat and Bernie swiped a hand along the back of her neck, pulling her hair from its hospital-regulation bun and shaking it out. It felt into her eyes as she bent to place her satchel on the floor. Serena walked back into the hallway from the kitchen, a few seconds later, and Bernie glanced up at her through the hair across her eyes. 

“I’ve nothing special for dinner,” Serena said, “but I did get a new bottle of my favourite wine - shiraz. Would you like some?” 

Bernie straightened up, tucking her hair behind her ears as she slipped her shoes off. Serena’s eyes followed the movement and Bernie cleared her throat self-consciously. “I’d love some,” she said, and Serena’s entire face lit up. 

Dinner was a near-repeat of Bernie’s first dinner at the Campbell flat: mince and potatoes, this time with broccoli, but it didn’t matter: Bernie and Serena ate slowly, more concerned with talking than with getting the food eaten while it was hot. The shiraz was, as promised, delicious, and Bernie took a long sniff of her glass before she sipped it, savouring the well-remembered scent from her travels through Europe before the war. 

Serena had kicked her shoes off halfway through the meal, and had turned sideways in her chair to put her feet up on the chair diagonally opposite. Bernie had also turned sideways, one leg crooked, leaning an elbow on her other knee, both feet on the chair beside her. One of Serena’s stockinged feet slid warm against the inside arch of her foot, and Bernie’s breath hitched slightly before Serena pulled away.

“Sorry,” Serena said briefly, eyes hooded over the top of her wine glass. “Tell me what happened in Paris, Bernie.”

Bernie froze, fork loaded with broccoli, halfway to her lips. “I…?” 

“Tell me about Alex,” Serena said, voice low. “I want to know, if you’re willing to share it.”

Bernie put her fork down, clattering clumsily against the porcelain plate. “You… want to know?”

“Always,” Serena said, reaching a hand out, gently tracing the veins on the back of Bernie’s hand.

“…Alright,” Bernie said, and stood up, placing her plate in the kitchen sink. At Serena’s confused glance she said, “Let’s - the couch?” and Serena nodded.

“I arrived in Paris in May 1939, four months before the war began,” Bernie began, sinking gratefully into the deep cushions of the couch. Serena perched herself on the other side of the couch, whole body turned to face Bernie. “I - no, I have to start earlier. I was brought up in Clydebank. You might’ve already guessed that…”

Serena nodded. “Your accent comes out, sometimes, when you’re stressed or angry.” 

“Aye,” Bernie muttered. “Stressed or angry, afraid or aroused… The men in my family worked at John Brown’s; we weren’t impoverished but there was a strong expectation that a good Presbyterian lass like me would become a teacher maybe, get married, and afterwards confine herself to doing good works in the community. After high school, I got a scholarship to Cambridge to do medicine. My dad hated it, hated… me, and after my first year there he decided that I was dead to the entire family.” 

Serena’s eyes widened, and she reached out to Bernie, a reflexive, aborted gesture of comfort.

“When I finished my degree I discovered there were very few opportunities for women doctors,” Bernie continued. “When Hitler ignored the Versailles Treaty and re-armed Germany in 1935, I realised that there might be another war, so I made inquiries and found out that an organisation was being set up called the Special Operations Executive. Unlike the medical clinics in London, the SOE was delighted to have a woman doctor on its staff, and I was assured that if war broke out, I’d be deployed immediately. As it happened, I was sent to Paris earlier, and I spent the majority of ’39 making my Resistance contacts and sending information home on French Nazi sympathisers.” Bernie paused, took a deep breath, as she stared down at her hands, folded in her lap. “The other woman in my little group was Alex Dawson. She was also a doctor; grew up in Yorkshire so we had a lot in common, both coming from the provinces. We got on well, Alex and I, and despite having no formal weapons training she was a better shot than either Henri or Marceau, so she and I used to team up often. Eventually…”

But Bernie’s voice had failed her, and Serena reached out, grasping Bernie’s hands in both of her own. Bernie stared down at Serena’s hands, and she felt uplifted, not trapped, by their strong hold. She looked up at Serena, and was startled to realise that Serena was already gazing back, eyes hooded but warm, supportive.

“Eventually,” Bernie muttered, “I realised that I was falling in love. I’m sure it was a war zone thing; I’m convinced it would never have happened had we not been under constant threat of invasion from Jerry - and I know it’s wrong, I know the Bible says women like me are an abomination, but… I haven’t been to kirk since I was seventeen and when she kissed me on New Year’s Eve ’39 in Paris with the lights of the Eiffel tower behind her, reflected in her eyes, nobody could’ve resisted that. And so I capitulated, I suppose. I was going to end it, was going to tell her it couldn’t continue but then I got shot and she died and I haven’t been able to sleep ever since without seeing her face in my dreams.” 

The room was deathly silent. Bernie held her breath. 

“I don’t think you’re an abomination,” Serena said quietly, and Bernie’s breath released in a rush. 

“You don’t?” 

“… No,” Serena said, a little louder. “Things like that… they just happen, don’t they? It’s nobody’s business but yours, and if you’re not harming anybody…”

Serena trailed off, glancing down at their hands, which Bernie realised were still wrapped around each other. She made to pull away, but Serena tightened her grip, and Bernie relaxed. 

“If you’re not harming anybody,” Serena repeated, looking back up at Bernie, an odd light in her eyes, “I don’t see the problem.” 

Bernie sagged, her entire torso releasing tension, and she smiled, tremulous. 

“I couldn’t bear it if you hated me,” she said, before she could think better of the words. 

Serena laughed, low, full of emotion. “I could never hate you,” she said, and in her smile Bernie read a kind of absolution. 

 

 

That night Bernie slept at Serena’s apartment, curled in a blanket, lying on her side on the couch. She felt more relaxed than she had in weeks, yet she still slept fitfully, dreams haunted by France. The Paris of her dreams was Dada-esque, surreal yet all too vivid: Hitler arrived, automobiles sweeping down the sacred stretch of the Champs-Élysées as crowds of Parisians stood, some sullen, some enthusiastically cheering and saluting. Bernie found herself standing in the crowd, the slight bulge of her gun under her coat, shoulder-to-shoulder with ordinary Parisians who were suddenly jeering, throwing tomatoes at the cars - but they seemed to glance off, and Bernie looked down at her coat and she was branded, pink triangle stark against the navy of her coat, and she tried to pull the triangle away but it was sewn into the wool fabric, so she took the coat off but the triangle was still there, pinned to her shirt - and she was on the verge of unbuttoning her shirt and going naked if it meant getting that damn triangle off but - 

“Bernie!”

She looked up. Dimly, on the opposite side of the Champs-Élysées, Alex stood, beautiful in Bernie’s own coat, short, dark hair blown away from her face by the wind. She beckoned, and Bernie reached out, took one longing, infinite step forward but - 

The crowd swirled around Bernie, and now they were shouting in German and Bernie knew little German but she knew this word: “ _Gräuel!_ _Gräuel!_ Abomination!” Bernie glanced away from Alex, at the crowd, circling closer, closer, SS stormtroopers now interspersed with the friendly Parisians she’d known: the local _boulanger_ , the wine-merchant, the butcher, all glowering, knives in hand - and she looked back at Alex in desperation just as Alex’s face began to change, eyes writhing in their sockets, perfect lips corrupted as if by acid or gas, and Bernie made one last attempt to escape the crowd, to go to Alex, but Alex threw her head back, arms extended and chest thrown forward as if shot in the back by a thousand bullets and the roar of the crowd overwhelmed Bernie’s senses ( _“Gräuel! Gräuel!_ Bernie! Bernie! _”_ ) - 

And then she was being shaken awake and Bernie launched herself off the couch, blanket tangled around her legs, and she shrieked her grief and rage into the darkness, only peripherally conscious of anyone else in the room. After a few minutes she quieted, heartbeat still racing, to find Serena kneeling beside her, one hand outstretched. Bernie slapped one hand against her left breast, grabbing at the material of her nightgown, sighing in relief when she felt no rough triangle of canvas. She leaned back against the side of the couch, body limp.

“Nightmare?” Serena asked, voice quieter than Bernie had ever heard it, and Bernie nodded grimly. 

“Hitler, on the Champs-Élysées,” Bernie said, shaking with the memory of it, and then muttered, “The white eyes writhing in her face, her hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin…”

“Oh, Bernie, darling,” Serena said, and reached out, gathering Bernie gently into her arms as Bernie shook and shook, clutching Serena’s waist uncontrollably and hanging on for dear life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m massively fudging the timeline with regards to the establishment of the SOE. It was only founded in 1940, so Bernie couldn’t have joined it in 1935, but I needed it for the story, so… sorry?  
> A note on Bernie’s theology: the Bible says absolutely jack squat about lesbians, but Bernie’s father probably told her otherwise. That being said, if anyone says anything to you about the Bible and lesbians, feel free to respond with a middle fingered salute. Source: ex-catholic me.  
> “The white eyes writhing in her face, her hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin…” is a misquote from Dulce et Decorum Est, by Wilfred Owen (all I’ve changed is the pronouns).


	6. Jericho!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And finally the war comes to Clydebank. Bernie's not sure how to cope - with the bombs or with her growing feelings for Serena.

12 March

Since Bernie had been elevated to co-lead of the AAU, she and Serena shared most shifts. Bernie had never been more grateful for their natural, easy, friendship: the shifts became longer, more gruelling, as the battle for Britain’s airspace drew to a gradual close and more pressure was placed on the Clyde industries to produce constantly newer, bigger, better war machines. That pressure meant more workplace accidents, which inevitably meant more calls on the red phone, Raf or Morven rushing constantly to their now-shared office - “Ms Campbell! Ms Wolfe!” - and, of course, more time spent in theatre.

The 12th of March was an especially busy day: Bernie and Serena arrived at 0800 hours, buying coffee and walking onto the ward in tandem. Then it was straight into theatre from 0815 onwards, fixing, patching up, making comfortable… Bernie slipped away during a break in surgeries just before 1300 hours, walking up to the roof and lighting up a cigarette. The sky was unusually clear for March: not a cloud in the sky, visibility clear all the way over to the shining ribbon of the Clyde, and Bernie tilted her head up, smiling, eyes closed as she soaked in the weak early-spring sun. 

“Bernie,” Serena’s voice was followed by the slam of the metal door leading to the roof, and Bernie turned around. Serena looked exhausted, face drawn and shoulders hunched, and she beckoned with one finger towards Bernie’s cigarette. 

“Here,” Bernie said, handing her cigarette over. Serena inhaled, smoke going straight to her lungs, and like Bernie had, she tilted her head back, letting the sun warm her slowly. Bernie fumbled in her pockets for her cigarette packet and lighter, and Serena opened one eye, looking sideways and grinning wryly. 

“Sorry,” she said. “It’s been a long day already.”

“Hasn’t it,” Bernie said, mumbling around the cigarette in her mouth. “At least maybe things will get better from here.”

“What makes you think that?” Serena asked, gazing out across the roof towards Glasgow town centre. 

Bernie shrugged. “I hear the Luftwaffe are nearly beat over London. The most sensible thing Hitler could do is call it a day for the air battle and focus on beating us on land.”

“Or on sea, where he’s got the advantage,” Serena agreed. “But who’s ever heard of Hitler being sensible? No, best not get your hopes up too soon, Bernie.”

They fell into an agreeable silence, each gazing out across the Clydebank rooftops. Bernie thought of all the women in her apartment building on the Kilbowie Road: Mrs McCaig, Mrs Malcolm, Mrs MacChruim, Mrs Houston, eking out the duration of the war, and she suddenly felt glad, an overwhelming sense of relief, that she was able to do a little more than most, to help the war effort.

“What do you have on this afternoon?” Bernie asked, turning to gaze at Serena, who was blowing a steady stream of smoke upwards, a miniature of the chimneys of the Holy City, long neck extended, reddened lips pursed to control the smoke. 

“No idea,” Serena said, half-grinning at Bernie, eyes still closed. “I guess we’ll wait and see. I would like to get some of those discharge forms finalised though, if we have a spare minute…”

Serena opened her eyes and turned around, stubbing the cigarette out as she continued talking. But Bernie paused, casting an eye over the Clydebank rooftops, fixing in her mind the tall, thin chimneys of the sandstone tenements, the larger chimneys with their darker smoke of the industrial complexes, the tall spire of the kirk she’d walked away from as a seventeen year old, to which she’d been too stubborn, too afraid, to return, all bounded by the shining, glimmering light of the Clyde River which wound its way around the edge of the town - and then Serena was calling, hand on the open door, and Bernie turned away; but the silhouette of those unforgettable chimneys remained fixed in her mind until the day she died, every last detail, as vivid in her dreams as the impersonal, threatening boulevards of Paris.

 

 

In point of fact neither Bernie nor Serena were able to finalise the discharge forms that afternoon: no sooner had they sat down at their desks in their shared office than Morven burst through the door: "Another accident from John Brown's!" 

Serena jumped up as Bernie put down her pen, casting a longing look towards her half-empty coffee cup. "How many?" Serena said, already sweeping out of the room with Morven. 

"Four critically injured, Ms Campbell, and another three with milder injuries. Bomb exploded when it was nearly finished." 

Bernie trailed after Serena and Morven, half-thinking, as she scrubbed up for theatre, that she should've stayed on the roof when she had the chance. 

Operating on the four critically injured workers took Bernie, Serena, Raf and Morven several hours, and when Bernie and Serena left the operating theatre Bernie was astonished to realise that it was already dark. She hovered awkwardly outside the office as she pulled her coat on, balancing the strap of her satchel on one knee. Serena sighed audibly, inside the office as she was shoving things into her own bag. 

“There wasn’t anything else we could have done,” Bernie said, pitching her voice deliberately low to avoid startling Serena, who turned, eyes fierce. 

“Sometimes you lose them, sometimes you don’t?” she asked, voice sarcastic.

“Something like that,” Bernie said, shrugging helplessly in recognition of the pointlessness of the platitude. Serena smiled, a little mirthlessly, winding her scarf about her neck as she walked out of the office. Bernie closed it behind them, and they began walking down to the bicycle rack together. 

“I suppose,” Bernie started, and trailed off. Serena looked up at her, slightly askance, and she tried again. “I suppose this is just… what war is.” 

“Losing good workers because of pointless, stupid accidents?” Serena asked, and Bernie realised Serena was furious, filled to the brim with righteous, inexpressible rage.

“Something like that,” Bernie said again, and she could see Serena gearing up for a fight, eyes flashing, taking a deep breath - and then she sagged, letting out all her breath in a long sigh, shoulders drooping. They were standing outside the hospital, chilly in the night air, but Serena didn’t seem to want to move, standing as if all the fight had suddenly left her. 

“I know,” she said, nearly silently. “It all seems so idiotic, though, so pointless.” 

“It is idiotic,” Bernie said, “the losses and the accidents, but… this war had to be fought, you know?”

“Yes,” Serena said again, and suddenly swayed forwards, closing her eyes. Bernie stretched out both hands to grasp her by the shoulders, and Serena leaned into the touch, just slightly. 

“You’re exhausted,” Bernie said, wrapping a hand around Serena’s shoulders. Serena tucked herself under Bernie’s arm, almost unconsciously, and Bernie smiled. 

“Come home with me?” Serena asked, and Bernie flushed, heat crawling up her neck and down into the pit of her stomach. Serena looked up at her, eyelids heavy, and Bernie felt like a fool as she continued, “Jason’s away tonight and I’d rather not be by myself.”

Bernie nodded on instinct, head jerking like a marionette as she began walking to their bicycles.

 

 

After a dinner accompanied by another small glass of wine, Bernie once more fell asleep on the couch, uncomfortable as she bent her long legs to fit but exhausted by her effort expended in theatre and Serena’s quiet despair at losing two of the most severely-injured patients.

Minutes, or maybe hours later, she woke up, sitting stiffly upright before she was fully conscious. She scrubbed one hand over her eyes, feeling slightly dazed, and confused about why she had woken, but adrenaline was coursing through her veins and she pushed the blankets aside, swinging her feet over the side of the couch and dressing herself, hands working on auto-pilot.

Serena came barrelling through the door into the living room, already dressed, suitcase in hand. Bernie’s eyes widened and she opened her mouth to ask something but - the nauseous, atonal whine of the air raid siren sounded again, and Bernie’s heart rate spiked sharply and in the space of a breath she was dressed and following Serena out the door. 

They pushed open the street door of Serena’s apartment building together. Outside, crowds of people were walking to the nearest Anderson shelter - some calmly, some with eyes wide in silent panic - suitcases in one hand, clutching children in the other. Serena and Bernie joined them, merging in with the crowd. Serena looped one finger around Bernie’s little finger to avoid getting lost, nearly unseen in the crush of people, and Bernie smiled, just slightly, above the roar of her heartbeat in her ears.

The air raid siren’s nasal whine was the only sound: even the children walked in terrified silence, wails of distress stopped while still in their throats. They reached the neighbourhood Anderson shelter, sheets of corrugated iron bolted together and embedded into the ground, and Bernie cast a speculative glance over it as she ducked her head, entering the doorway. The shelter was crowded, families huddled together on all sides, and Bernie stopped in her tracks, looking about in all directions for a spot to sit down. A few seconds went by, and then Serena tugged on her hand - Bernie had forgotten; they were still holding hands - and pulled her to one of the back corners. 

Bernie sat down, heavily, on one corner of Serena’s suitcase. The shelter was dark, the combined presence of so many people turning the air stuffy and unbearably warm. The air raid siren continued, unforgettably loud, and Bernie felt her mind slipping as the sound wormed its way into her subconscious. Serena sat down on the opposite side of the suitcase, legs and sides and shoulders touching, and Bernie shivered despite how blank her mind had become. 

Serena must have felt the shiver, because she turned to Bernie and whispered in her ear. “Alright?” 

Bernie nodded, almost an involuntary spasm. “Fine,” she said, and maybe Serena read the lie in the timbre of her voice or the tension of her shoulders, because she slipped one hand around Bernie’s shoulders and pulled her close. 

Out of the darkness, someone was handing Bernie a cup of strong coffee. She wrapped her hands around it gratefully and looked up to thank them, but they had already faded back into the uniform dark of the shelter. She took a long sip: hot, smelling strongly of chicory, but it was something around which to wrap her hands, and she closed her eyes, leaning sideways into Serena as she savoured the bitter taste. 

Suddenly Bernie cocked her head to one side: above the atonal shriek of the air raid siren, there came another, deeper siren, no less atonal than the air raid, but accompanied by the low thunder of a bomber engine. 

“ _Jericho!”_ she whispered, and Serena’s hand tightened around her shoulders. 

“It’s a Stuka?” Serena whispered back, a little louder, and someone sitting near Serena overheard and passed it on - _stuka! stuka! stuka -_

Bernie closed her eyes, strengthening her resolve and her grit as she waited for it - 

_Whump!_ And then the ear shattering sound as the bomb exploded.

Both Bernie and Serena flinched, badly; Bernie slopped coffee over her hand, swearing under her breath as the hot liquid burned her. 

The sound of the Stuka’s engine did not diminish; there was no sense that the bomber had passed. Instead, Bernie could hear the continually renewed roar of more and more aircraft passing overhead, the Jericho sirens interplaying over the sound of the air raid siren, combined with the regular _whump!_ and explosion of bombs.

“Surely the anti-aircraft guns up by the castle must be in action?” Serena said, and Bernie strained her ears for all they were worth, but shook her head. 

“I can’t hear them.”

Serena moved a little closer, plucking the coffee cup out of her hand and taking a sip herself. 

“It was never this loud in London,” Bernie said after a while, voice a little unsteady. 

Serena turned to look at her; Bernie was able to see one raised eyebrow through the gloom. 

“We used to use the underground stations as bomb shelters. They were far enough underground that you couldn’t hear much, but this is, this is - ” Bernie took a huge, gasping breath, realising she was shaking, badly, and she closed her eyes, trying to keep the panic hidden. 

“Hey.” A soft hand was covering one side of her face, and Bernie opened her eyes. Serena was gazing down at her, eyes liquid in the darkness, fingers gently stroking her jaw. 

“Alright?” Serena said softly, and Bernie suddenly understood that all her self-control had deserted her, here under fire in a hole in the ground, and she leaned forward and kissed her. Serena gasped a little, open-mouthed in surprise, and Bernie fitted their lips together in a kiss that swept away all awareness of their surroundings, as her eyes closed in relief at the warmth of Serena’s lips. 

It took the space of four breaths before Bernie was able to regain her iron self-control. Once she had, she pulled away immediately, hand retreating to Serena’s collarbone where she was able to feel the pounding stutter of Serena’s heartbeat, seeming louder and certainly more welcome than the sound of the Stuka engines. Reluctantly, she opened her eyes, sweeping her gaze from Serena’s lips - wet, because of her kisses, oh God - to her eyes - dark, pupils blown wide, with that same intense gaze she’d seen only once before. Bernie’s breath hitched, and she opened her mouth to - what? apologise? - to say something, to make it better, but Serena’s hand around her elbow twitched, involuntary, desperate, and this time it was Serena who leaned forward and captured Bernie’s lips in a blazing, fierce kiss that left Bernie scrabbling with hands and knees to get as close as she possibly could.

 

 

As soon as the first light dawned, Bernie and Serena emerged from the Anderson shelter. The morning light was grey, filtering eerily through the smoke which blanketed the entire street, shot through only with unearthly streaks of red from the fires which the bombs had started. Serena stopped dead in the street, hand flying to her mouth in horror, but Bernie wrapped a hand around her elbow and pulled her onwards, her prior panic forgotten. 

The street was a mess: bricks, masonry and metal covered the pavement and there was a gigantic pothole a little further down, which must have been caused by a bomb. Bernie stole a quick glance at Serena, who was staring, open-mouthed, at the devastation as they walked past. 

“Mind out! Mind out there!” 

Bernie and Serena jumped aside as a man in a blood-stained military uniform came running into the road from a house which, although previously one of the largest in the street, was now no more than a shell. They looked upwards: they could see into the house’s interior, dining table set ready for an ordinary Wednesday morning which would never come, radio sitting on a shelf, and then they looked further upwards and saw an unexploded landmine, swinging gently from a parachute caught in the rafters, heralding sudden death from the skies. 

Bernie stepped forward to help, off the opposite pavement and into the road, but Serena’s hand shot out, catching her in the stomach and causing her to suddenly stop. 

“Wh-?” she turned to Serena, but Serena had already moved, pulling her away from the landmine, back towards her own flat. 

“You can’t help,” Serena muttered, voice low and strangled-sounding.

“But-”

“The military will be here soon,” Serena said in that same strange tone. “There’s nothing you can do.”

Bernie glanced at Serena, who refused to meet her eyes, free hand swiping - as if in a self-soothing response to stress - at her lips. Bernie felt a flush of shame rush through her: of course, Serena was awkward and embarrassed in Bernie’s presence; hadn’t it been Bernie who kissed her and caused those laughter lines to turn downwards, that frown to place itself on Serena’s beautiful face?

A touch of Serena’s hand on Bernie’s arm roused her from her thoughts; they had reached Serena’s apartment. By some impossible miracle it was still standing: a little damaged along one side, but erect, able to be lived in, and Bernie sighed out in relief, the thick knot of tension in her stomach unravelling. She turned towards Serena, who let out a small, stifled sound. 

“Serena?” Bernie moved microscopically closer, and Serena let out that awful hiccupy noise again.Bernie’s hand hovered awkwardly over Serena’s shoulder, and maybe Serena felt the heat radiating off Bernie, because she glanced upwards, meeting Bernie’s eyes for a fraction of a second before she buried her face in her hands, crying in earnest. 

Bernie pulled Serena into her arms, gently cradling her by the back of the head with one hand, wrapping the other around her shoulders. 

“Don’t -” Serena started, and hiccuped again. “Don’t be nice to me, Bernie. You’ll make it worse.” 

Bernie frowned, resting her head sideways against Serena’s, feeling her short hair tickle her cheekbone. 

“I’m… sorry?” Bernie offered, pulling Serena a little closer, running her thumb over Serena’s wrist, upon which was inked the tiny nautical-star tattoo (surely she could give herself that, at least; this small modicum of comfort, the knowledge of tenuous possibility), but Serena gazed upwards at her, eyes brimming with fresh tears, and shook her head slightly. 

“Not you,” she said, sniffing loudly. “I just… this house, I thought it was destroyed and - my God, what about your flat?”

Bernie’s eyes widened as fresh panic set in, and she turned away from Serena’s gaze. 

“I had better-” she started, and looked back, swiping her thumb unconsciously over Serena’s cheekbone to wash away the tears, cradling Serena's jaw in her palm- 

Serena's tiny, gasped intake of breath roused her from her thoughts and she pivoted, turning away and striding towards the bicycles, leaning against the wall of Serena's house. She flung herself on, and cycled away, trying desperately not to look back. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys I got internet!! Thank you so much for all your patience - you're amazing <3
> 
> Anderson shelter = six corrugated iron sheets held together by no. 8 chicken wire and rivets.  
> Scott Street = towards the Glasgow side of Clydebank.  
> “Surely the anti-aircraft guns near the castle must be in action?” No, they weren’t (citation: my grandfather, who lived through this). The reason why: the anti-aircraft (ack-ack) guns had run out of ammunition because they needed a particular type of ammunition, which had been diverted to towns considered more likely to be heavily bombed by the Germans. Note that I’ve included this because my granddad said it, but I’ve been unable to work out which castle he’s likely talking about.


	7. Red Sky in the Morning, Shepherd's Warning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bernie and Serena attempt to cope with the aftermath of the blitz. 
> 
> TW: discussion of war. I'm not kidding. It's not graphic (no gore) but it's pretty awful, so just be careful.

The road was newly uneven, potholed by bombs and shrapnel, littered with the debris and rubble flung by the force of explosions which had met their mark, and Bernie had to concentrate as she steered her bicycle. She cycled frantically down the length of the Dumbarton Road, by the river: as she passed John Brown’s Shipyards and Singer’s factory she spared a glance towards them, looking for the telltale fires that would signify that the Luftwaffe bombers had hit their strategic targets, but to her surprise she saw none. Instead the chimneys were pouring out smoke, rich and black in the fire-streaked clouds of morning. Many homes hadn’t been so lucky, though: on nearly every block Bernie saw home owners creating chains to pass buckets in the vain hope of ending the fires. Others were sitting on the roadside kerb, heads in their hands as they contemplated the sudden destruction of their houses and possessions. The air was full of dust, stinging Bernie’s eyes as she cycled through it and staining her hair and clothes an unearthly grey.

Further down the Dumbarton Road, a block before the Kilbowie Road intersection, Bernie sighed, letting her shoulders drop and releasing some of the tension that tightened her back. How damn stupid could she be, she thought, to have kissed Serena? And then, not content with ruining her life a second time (because falling in love with your spy partner in an occupied war zone wasn’t enough; because watching that partner die in front of you apparently wasn’t enough heartache for one lifetime) she nearly kissed Serena again. How damn stupid. But oh - Serena’s eyes, and her soft lips and her hands which reached for Bernie, which pulled Bernie closer in violation of all social laws - and Bernie realised that the road before her was blurry and indistinct, and that the wetness on her cheeks was not rain but tears, hot and acidic, and she pulled to the side of the road and bowed her head as if waiting for some benediction that might never come.

From a distance, Bernie heard the sound of feet slapping against the pavement, uneven as if the person was very nearly winded. She glanced up, viciously pinching the bridge of her nose in an attempt to stop crying. A man rounded a corner into the Dumbarton Road, leaning on the wall in order not to fall down, and stumbled towards her, wearing a torn and blood-stained Air Raid Warden’s uniform. She dismounted from her bicycle, leaning it precariously against a still-standing lamppost as she moved rapidly towards him. 

“Sir-"

He grabbed at her, cold hands pawing at her shoulders as he moved past. 

“Don’t go down to the Holy City!”

“Sir?”

“Don’t go down to the Holy City!” His eyes were blank, pupils blown wide with grief and panic, as his hands moved clammily over her arms. Bernie was unable to suppress the shudder which ran through her as he moved away, still muttering repetitively under his breath, “Don’t go down to the Holy City!”

He shuffled up the Dumbarton Road, away from Bernie, and she turned to watch him, aghast at his grief and her own inability to help.

“Bernie!” 

Bernie whipped her head around: Serena, riding on a bicycle towards her, hair dishevelled and panting.

“Serena?” 

Serena jumped off the bicycle, letting it fall to the ground as she closed the distance between herself and Bernie in a couple of steps. She gazed up at Bernie, who swallowed roughly as Serena wrapped her hands around Bernie’s shoulders, her touch warming Bernie from the inside out. 

“Why’d you come here?” Bernie asked eventually.

“We weren’t done talking,” she said, gaze steady, “and I decided I could be of more help here, with you, than standing staring at my mostly-intact apartment.”

Bernie moved back a little, hands flying up seemingly of their own accord to frame Serena’s face, and Serena’s eyes fluttered shut, uncaring that they were in public. 

“I kissed you,” Bernie said, and her voice cracked. “I took advantage of you, my God, I kissed you.”

“Did you not realise I kissed you back?” Serena asked, and when she glanced up Bernie gasped, aroused beyond belief merely by the heat and force of her gaze. 

“It doesn’t mean you wanted it!” Bernie said. "It doesn’t mean I was right to give in to my own selfish, idiotic desires!”

Serena's face twisted oddly, and she used her hands, still around Bernie's shoulders, to push, shoving Bernie against the wall. Bernie's breath huffed out, sharply, and she relaxed her initial instinct to push Serena away, instead leaning backwards, pliant, feeling the bricks scrape against her back.

Serena stepped further into Bernie's space, grasping her jaw in one hand. She took a deep breath and spoke, voice harsh and pitched low. ”I want you so much it's been the only thing I can think of for weeks, Berenice Wolfe.” 

Bernie gasped, body sagging loose, head rolled back against the wall and Serena read it as the admission of reciprocated desire that it was, and her fingers spasmed briefly along the long expanse of Bernie’s throat as she slid her hand down, towards Bernie’s collarbone.

“I didn’t think you were… like that,” Bernie said softly, tentatively touching Serena’s waist, where the base of her ribs met the flare of her hips. “I’ve tried to keep it hidden, but I haven’t been able to think of anything but you ever since… ever since I met you, I think.”

“I didn’t think I was like that either,” Serena said. “You’ve terrified the life out of me, but I want you more than anything.”

Bernie shivered and moaned, soft, in the back of her throat.

And then Serena pulled away, after one last long glance at Bernie, turning to gaze towards the intersection between the Dumbarton Road and Kilbowie Road. She shivered, slightly, taking a long breath as if to steel herself, and held out a hand towards Bernie, who stared a little, mind still caught on ‘ _want you more than anything…’_

“They may need us,” Serena said, and her mouth twisted, bitter as Passover herbs. 

Bernie nodded, pushing herself off the wall and catching Serena’s hand, steering her bicycle with the other, and together, they walked to the Kilbowie Road intersection. 

The still-smoking rubble spilled out onto the Dumbarton Road, little pieces of brick and sandstone and metal and worse. Twisted lengths of steel - building struts, or internal reinforcements - clambered up from the heaped rubble in a cruel mimicry of support once provided. Here and there flames danced, joyful, over the rubble, as if set for a funeral pyre, and they were unable to be extinguished, for as Bernie turned, frantic for a hydrant outlet, she realised that the water main on the Dumbarton Road had been hit, and the water which might have ended the Kilbowie fires was spilled, useless, in a Dumbarton flood.

Beside her, Serena made an odd choking sound, and as Bernie glanced over, her gaze fell upon the tall sandstone tenements, or rather, the space where they had once been. The red sky was visible through the windows of the tenement buildings, which were now only shells, gutted and mutilated by bombs. Bernie gazed up the length of the road, a curious buzzing in her ears: not one building was left unharmed, all gutted or utterly destroyed. One lamppost stood drunkenly in the middle of the street, bulb still intact, and Bernie discovered in a flash of clarity that her hand, still clasped in Serena’s, was somehow much higher than it had been before. And then Serena was beside her, one hand wrapped around her shoulders, and Bernie realised that she had fallen to her knees, free hand clawing its way into this homeland dirt of its own accord, head bowed as if in prayer. 

“Bernie.”

Silence. She had seen Paris fall. 

“Bernie.”

She took a deep breath in. She had seen Alex die in front of her, martyred for this Nazi barbarity.. 

“Bernie.”

She turned her head, staring directly at Serena. She had never even considered that the destruction might follow her home, and she got up, one foot flat, then the other, levering herself upright as if she were a thousand years old. She stood facing Serena, swaying slightly with exhaustion and disbelief, and when Serena was also standing upright Bernie grasped her by the shoulders for support.

“We have to do something,” she said, voice tight with rage. 

“I have a number for the military headquarters here,” Serena said. “You could phone them after our shift.” 

“It’s a start,” Bernie agreed. “They must have foreseen this, surely; it would be lunatic to suggest otherwise.”

Serena hummed, low in the back of her throat as she placed her hands over Bernie’s, squeezing gently before pulling them off her shoulders and lacing their fingers together between them. 

“Although Westminster has understood that cities other than London might be Luftwaffe targets,” she said, very low into Bernie’s ear, “there have been… problems, with their willingness to equip those cities accordingly. I can’t guarantee that contacting military headquarters here will have any effect; but we can try. We’ll try everything, I promise you.”

“Why am I not surprised at Westminster’s incompetence,” Bernie said, conscious of Serena’s proximity and warmth, and her fingers shivered slightly around Serena’s. “If it doesn’t work we’ll try something else.”

 

 

 

The hospital was, thankfully, unharmed by the bombing, but it was clear that it had been open throughout the night and was now at bursting-point. Ambulances were parked haphazardly around the main entrance, and more were coming in as Bernie and Serena cycled towards it. They leaned their bicycles against a side wall and rushed inside, both walking faster than normal, only to collide with an ambulance driver walking out. 

“Sorry - sorry,” he said, slurring his words slightly, eyes half-closed. 

“Are you alright, man?” Bernie asked, steadying him with a hand on the arm. 

“This’s my tenth trip today,” he said, and grimaced, rubbing his eyes vigorously. “Twelfth? Hell, I forget. More to come, too. So many dead. Sorry-” and he walked off, swaying a little as he opened the door of his ambulance and got in. Bernie and Serena stared after him as he drove off: the vehicle hit the kerb but glanced off, and continued on. 

“I wouldn’t trust him behind the wheel of any car I owned,” Serena said. “He was exhausted. Why was there no backup?” 

Bernie shrugged as they raced up the stairs towards the AAU. “Not an unusual story right now, is it? The anti-aircraft guns at the castle lacked ammunition; there were too few Anderson shelters for this population; there’s no back up for ambulance drivers, let alone the air raid wardens or any other personnel: it’s obvious Westminster was woefully unprepared for an attack on the Clyde.”

Serena nodded, looking grim as they burst onto the ward. The noise and chaos of the ward hit them the moment they opened the double doors, and Raf rushed up to them, a stack of clipboards in hand.

“Raf!” Serena said, a note of shock in her voice. “How are you and the children?” 

“Have you seen the Kilbowie Road?” Bernie asked, and Raf nodded grimly. 

“We made it down to the Anderson shelter,” he said, “and we’re alright, but staying here for now.”

“I’m glad you’re ok,” Serena said, clasping his arm with one hand as she took the clipboards from him. “You need anything, you just let me know, alright?” 

He nodded, the shine of tears in his eyes before he blinked them away. “The ward’s at full capacity already,” he said, “and more coming in all the time. I don’t know how much longer we can keep this up, Ms Campbell.” 

Serena frowned. “We can’t turn people away. We’ll have to just do the best we can.”

Bernie pulled at Serena’s sleeve as a thought occurred to her, and Serena nodded to Raf briefly and turned, focusing on Bernie. 

“Would you give me permission to organise the ward the way I’d organise it in the field?” she asked, and Serena’s eyebrows quirked up. 

“I’ve wished for a while I could have met you in Paris,” Serena said, a wicked gleam in her eye, and Bernie gulped. “So if it will help, then yes, go ahead.” 

Bernie grasped Serena’s elbow briefly in confirmation, grinning a little at the flex of muscle beneath Serena’s jacket, and turned to the ward. 

“Alright everybody, stop what you’re doing and listen up, please.” Her voice rang out across the ward and one by one people turned, compelled by the strength of her voice and her confidence. “"I need CT over here, GS here, and you stay where you are, Raf. We’re going to keep the patients moving through; we need to create a flow, ok?” She cast her gaze around the ward: staff nodded, one by one as they understood the logistics, and she smiled. “Great.”

Bernie turned back towards Serena, who was standing by their office, another stack of files in hand. Serena’s smile was blinding, wide despite her physical and emotional exhaustion, and when Bernie walked over Serena moved close, less than an inch of space between them. 

“Just as good as I’d imagined,” Serena said, laughter in her eyes and voice despite her stress. 

“You like Major Wolfe, then, do you?” Bernie asked, voice pitched deliberately low, sticking close by as Serena backed them into their office. 

“Very much,” Serena said, and the laughter had vanished, replaced by a roughened tone which Bernie realised was testament to Serena’s considerable arousal. Bernie reached out, still a little hesitant, touching Serena gently where her hips flared out, and she felt the shiver run through Serena, full bodied and unashamed. 

“It’s going to be a long day today,” Bernie said, and Serena hummed, smoothing out the wrinkles of Bernie’s shirt, fingers running softly over her collarbone. Bernie continued, voice full of regret, “We should… we should get going.”

Serena’s eyes were blatantly tracking the movement of Bernie’s lips, although her hand was still smoothing out Bernie’s shirt (this is a neutral gesture, Bernie thought wildly to herself, any woman would touch her friend like this, any woman, no passers-by could read anything unusual or strange into this, right?). At Bernie’s words she nodded, but her hand on Bernie’s collarbone crept upwards, tracking the expanse of her neck before wrapping around her nape. Bernie shivered, gazing down at Serena whose eyes were so full of affection, and her hand on Serena’s side moved upwards, just a little.

“A hug, then, before we go,” Serena said, and Bernie grinned, wrapping her hands around Serena without hesitation. Serena was warm and steady in Bernie’s arms, and Bernie breathed out, breath gusting warm against Serena’s ear. A miscalculation: Serena shuddered, desire suddenly obvious, and her hand moved, thumb on Bernie’s cheekbone, and then they were cheek-to-cheek, Serena’s skin - impossibly soft - warming Bernie’s own, and in that moment Bernie didn’t think she’d ever longed for a kiss more.

One breath. 

Two breaths. Bernie could allow herself this, breasts pressed close against Serena’s, hands wrapped around Serena’s waist. 

Three breaths. 

Four breaths. And then Bernie moved, pulled back, gazed at Serena’s dark eyes, her smile, and pressed her lips briefly against Serena’s jaw before moving away. 

“We’d better - ” she said, and Serena nodded with visible regret, standing still as Bernie moved away.

“Stay with me tonight,” Serena said as Bernie was nearly out the door, words tumbling out of her mouth in a rush, and Bernie almost turned back into Serena’s embrace, shocked by the words and by what Serena could not - possibly! - be implying. 

“Are you sure?” she asked, turning around past the lintel of the office door. 

Serena smiled at her, eyes soft, as she unconsciously touched the spot on her jaw where Bernie’s lips had been mere seconds before. “Your flat is ruined; you need somewhere to stay.”

Bernie stuttered her thanks, and with an immense force of will she walked off, back to the hustle of the ward, but her mind returned, of its own volition, to Serena’s words periodically throughout the day to analyse her tone, her gesture, her look…

 

 

 

Dinner was suffused with a new kind of tension, Bernie thought as she spooned peas into her mouth late that night. Bernie was far too tired to make any sort of move, and Serena looked asleep on her feet, cutting up her potatoes and shovelling them into her mouth as if on auto-pilot, movements uncoordinated and jerky; but the knowledge of their kiss the previous night and the subsequent acknowledgement of their mutual attraction lent even ordinary comments a new luminosity. 

“Salt?” Bernie asked, and the brush of fingers as Serena passed it over caused both women a quick, shuddered intake of breath.

Later, Serena drank from her wine glass, licking her lips slowly, carefully, to ensure that no wine had been spilled; and at the sight of Serena’s glistening lips Bernie clenched her thighs together tightly, trying to pretend she hadn’t seen, unable to look away…

“I’ll bunk down on the sofa,” Bernie said cheerfully at the end of the meal, when all the dishes had been washed and put away, when she had run out of possible excuses to stay close to Serena’s warmth and her slow, deliberate movements around the kitchen. 

Serena paused as she looped the tea towel over the handle of the oven. “Alright,” she said slowly. “Are you sure?” 

“I’m sure,” Bernie said, scanning Serena’s eyes. “Why? Would you rather I, I…” but she trailed off, thinking of curling her body around Serena in her own bed, but not quite brave enough to get the words out, and Serena’s faint smile drooped, just a little.

“If you’re sure, then,” she said, and Bernie pasted her smile back on, nodding vigorously as she walked towards the sofa.

 

 

Bernie was famed in her Resistance cell for her ability to sleep anywhere, at any time; but that night she tossed and turned, unable to sleep but too tired to forgo sleep entirely. She lay awake for what felt like hours, staring up at the plaster ceiling, hyper-aware of the light seeping out from the crack under the doorway of Serena’s bedroom. The light reflected faintly on the ceiling, sending golden shards of light scattering across the plaster - but - what? Bernie noticed, in a daze, that the shards were moving, and she turned her head towards Serena’s doorway, hardly daring to breathe. Serena was standing just past the lintel, wreathed in the light from her room, and she extended a hand to Bernie, simultaneously wry and hopeful. 

“I couldn’t sleep,” she said. 

Bernie breathed out, “Neither could I,” and Serena smiled, a look of benediction. 

“Please,” she asked, and Bernie tossed herself off the sofa, trailing her blanket behind her and reaching for Serena’s hand as she walked back into her room. 

Serena’s room was warm, lit by the golden light of a single lamp, and Serena moved purposefully towards the bed. Bernie felt her heartbeat pounding in her ears, exhausted beyond belief and yet still so turned on, watching Serena’s every move as if in slow motion. Serena pulled back the covers, crawling into the middle of the bed and extending both hands towards Bernie in silence. 

Viscerally, Bernie felt the last of her terror disappear, shoulders lowering and breath coming easier, and she crawled into the bed too, pulling the covers over herself and Serena, who pressed a kiss to Bernie’s cheekbone before turning over and pulling Bernie against her. Bernie tentatively wrapped one arm over Serena’s waist, holding her close, and was rewarded by her smile, just visible over the curve of her shoulder. Soon, Serena’s breathing evened out and both women dropped easily into sleep. 

 

 

In later years, Bernie would sometimes go over that night in her mind, attempting to piece together her shattered memories into a coherent narrative. She failed every time. If she ever decided to see a psychologist she knew they would tell her that the trauma had caused her to lose the pattern of her memories, turning that night into a series of vignettes, interrelated but without any coherence. But she remembered some things:

Two in the morning: Bernie, woken by the screaming wail of the air raid sirens. Serena jerked awake next to her, sitting up rapidly, swinging her legs over the side of the bed to get dressed. 

Bernie and Serena, walking to the air raid shelter, picking their way across the rubble of the previous night’s bombing. There were fewer people walking with them: some had died, some had left town. The silence was palpable, eerie. 

The air raid shelter was less packed. Nobody came around with coffee this time; Bernie didn’t know if the woman had died, been evacuated, or, like so many others, simply walked her way out of the Dumbarton area. 

The sound of the bombers overhead: the famed, earth-shattering Jericho siren, the _whump_! of the bombs, the awful, horrible silence above all other noises which should have been filled by the anti-aircraft guns.

The tightness in Bernie’s chest; months outside of an active war zone had softened her, apparently, and where she should have been hard, resolute, focused on the danger around her she was panicky, thinking not of the destruction she might wreak on the Nazis but of the destruction they wrought on her own - 

Serena’s arms around her, strong, resolute enough for both of them. Serena’s cheek against her own, Serena’s thigh pressed tight against her - 

Bernie’s sudden realisation: _I love her._ Dear God. Fighting the sudden, overpowering instinct to retreat, she moved closer, pulling Serena towards her in the dark corner of the shelter, finding comfort and relief in her warmth. _I’m in love with her._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Don’t go down to the Holy City!” is real; as a child my grandmother and great-grandmother made the journey from Scott St (near the Glaswegian [I think]) side of Clydebank down to Dalmuir, past Kilbowie Rd. They bumped into a man “in a terrible state” (direct quote from my grandmother) near Kilbowie Rd who apparently kept on repeating “Don’t go down to the Holy City! Don’t go down to the Holy City!” over and over. I’ve included it because it’s a great example of the kind of trauma real people experienced during this blitz, even if my grandmother (bless her emotionally-incompetent little soul) doesn’t see this.  
> PS: Realistically, surgeons like Serena and Bernie would probably have pulled a double-all-nighter during the blitz: I sincerely doubt either Serena or Bernie would’ve got home to sleep or eat on the second night. That being said, I needed them to share a bed, so tough. Willing suspension of historical disbelief, y’all.


	8. Red Sky at Night, Shepherd's Delight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Military high command make life very difficult for Bernie and Serena, but temporarily Bernie finds herself unable to care.

The new day dawned, cold and predictably damp. Bernie and Serena walked back to Serena’s flat in miserable silence, fingers brushing past each other where their hands fell at their sides. Both felt exhausted by the events of the previous two nights, incapable even of rage against the Luftwaffe who had wrought such unprecedented destruction. 

“I’m pretty sure this is it for Clydebank,” Serena mumbled as she was unlocking her front door, Bernie draped beside her, boneless and exhausted.

Bernie made a sound in the back of her throat as she pushed herself off the lintel and walked in, and Serena read it correctly as an interrogative.

“People won’t come back,” Serena said sadly. “Too much destruction, too much death. What do they have to come back to?”

“What about the famed Clydebank sense of community,” Bernie suggested. 

Serena shrugged, expressive and French despite her exhaustion, despite the months spent away from the war in Paris, and Bernie’s heart gave a _ping!._

“I doubt we can come back from this,” she said, wandering through to the kitchen. “It’s been too horrible, too shocking.”

Bernie made another little noise in the back of her throat and sat down, heavily, on the sofa where she’d spent some of the previous night. She closed her eyes, stretching her legs out under the coffee table, and her awareness of her surroundings began to swim, hazily: the dark of the shelter last night, the glimmer of light reflected in Serena’s eyes as they gazed at each other, the softness of Serena’s lips the few times they’d touched - Bernie groaned, slightly, and let her head fall back against the back of the sofa. How could she have been so utterly stupid as to fall in love with Serena? 

“Well you're a sight for sore eyes!” Serena’s voice was teasing, and Bernie’s eyes flew open as she sat upright, blushing furiously.

“Steady on,” Serena continued, grinning slightly as she held a mug in each hand. “I remembered I had a small bag of real coffee, and I figured, well. What better time to drink it than now?” 

The smell of the coffee wafted its way over to Bernie, who, before the war, had possessed a rampant addiction to the stuff. “Oh my God,” she said, reaching out for a cup without thinking. “I could kiss you, Serena Campbell!” 

Serena paused, cup halfway to her lips.

Bernie froze. 

“I, uhh…”

Serena put her cup down on the coffee table. Took Bernie’s cup from her, put it down on the coffee table. Sat down beside Bernie.

Kissed her.

And the world seemed to explode into colour as Serena’s lips touched Bernie; all Bernie could smell was Serena, her perfume, her soap, the clean scent of antibacterial wash. Serena’s hands were everywhere: the back of Bernie’s neck, her jaw, and Bernie gasped, open-mouthed and desperate as Serena wound her hands into Bernie’s hair, her grip firm, decisive. 

Bernie scrabbled closer. She ended up balanced on Serena’s thigh, one leg supporting herself on the sofa, the other between Serena’s. They fitted together as closely as possible, breasts and bellies flush, and at the sensation Bernie found her mind going blissfully blank, all concerns wiped clean by the drag of Serena’s body against her own.

Serena kissed her way down Bernie’s jaw, mouth hot against Bernie’s skin, cooled by the outdoor air. Bernie’s hands found their way back to Serena’s waist, moving hesitantly upwards under her shirt, and at the first tentative brush of Bernie’s fingers over Serena’s breast Serena paused in kissing Bernie’s throat and whispered, _yes, yes, touch me,_ and Bernie felt her mind might explode with the revelation of Serena, above her, around her, irrevocably a part of her.

And then the grandfather clock in the hall chimed, sounding the time as 6:30 in the morning. Both women froze, Bernie’s hand on Serena’s breast, and Serena groaned in frustration, letting her head fall heavily onto Bernie’s shoulder. 

“I can’t believe this,” she said, “but we’re going to have to leave soon.” 

Bernie nodded mechanically. “Have to get to the hospital. I’d better-” and she moved to stand up, unable to fully meet Serena’s eyes. But Serena stretched out a hand, grasping her forearm, and Bernie forced herself to look up.

Serena’s eyes were ablaze, her lips wet and kiss-bitten, and Bernie gasped a little, breath caught in the back of her throat.

“I want you,” Serena said, low, almost a growl, “and I am so unbelievably sorry that we have to go.”

Bernie turned Serena’s hand over, exposing the wrist, the small, nautical-star tattoo. 

“I want you too,” she said, wincing internally at the half-truth of it ( _I love you I love you I-),_ and she pressed a long kiss to the centre of the star. Serena’s eyes fluttered shut, head rolling back a little at the sensation, before she forced her eyes open again, watching Bernie’s lips pressed to the ink in her skin. 

When she could speak, Serena mumbled, “You’re incredible.”

Bernie blushed, colour high on her cheeks. “So are you,” she muttered, and Serena grinned. 

 

 

The day ran busier than Bernie had ever experienced, even in the depths of German-occupied Paris. Bernie and Serena operated on the worst-injured patients together as they were brought in: Morven and Raf operated on the less-injured, and the few nursing staff who had remained in the hospital, while the others rode the ambulances and provided front-line services, helped both pairs of doctors.

When it finally came time for lunch, Bernie staggered back to their shared office, eyes gritty with exhaustion and desperate for a cup of tea. Serena was already in the office, wading through a stack of paperwork, and Bernie leaned against the door lintel for a couple of seconds before making her presence known, gazing fondly at Serena. She had never before felt the overwhelming sense of peace she felt with Serena, the indescribable feeling of rightness. Despite her long-standing sense of alienation from her hometown, and despite the destruction which had been wrought on Clydebank, Bernie thought slowly that she was glad she’d been invalided from the SOE and sent up from London; knowing and loving Serena was a reward far beyond anything she could ever deserve.

Serena looked up from her paperwork and grinned, a tired but genuine smile that made Bernie grin back in response. “Hello there,” she said, extending a hand to Bernie, who took it, kicking the door shut and sitting down next to Serena, stretching her legs out in front of her. 

“God, I’m tired,” Bernie mumbled.

Serena laughed, a low sound that possessed more sympathy than mirth. “Me too.”

“I was thinking…” Bernie trailed off, and Serena turned her head a little to glance at her out the corner of her eye. 

“Thinking?” she asked, and Bernie smirked, just a bit. 

“I do it sometimes!” 

“Sometimes a little too much,” Serena mumbled, and both women blushed at the memory of Bernie’s earlier panic that she’d somehow coerced Serena into a kiss.

“I… uh.” Bernie shook her head, hair flying out like a halo. “No, what I was thinking was, if you’re serious about it, we should contact Clydebank military headquarters as soon as possible.”

Serena nodded vigorously, pushing her chair back and standing up. “I think we should. It can’t do any harm, anyway.”

The only telephone on the ward which was not kept scrupulously free, in case of emergency, was in a small cupboard off to one side. The tiny room contained: a telephone, a phone book, a perforated notepad, a pen, and a small bench to sit on. Bernie and Serena squeezed themselves inside, Bernie standing awkwardly at right angles to Serena, back against the far end of the cupboard.

“You should call,” Serena said, picking the receiver up and holding it out to Bernie, who shook her head. 

“No, you should,” she argued. “You’re in charge of this ward.” 

“So are you,” Serena said, frowning slightly. “And besides, you’re the Major. I’m just a civilian ex-Resistance doctor.”

Bernie gazed at Serena appraisingly. “You think they won’t listen to a civilian?” 

“Bernie, you’re a legend,” Serena said, a note of finality in her voice. “You make the call.” 

Bernie shrugged dismissively, but took the receiver from Serena, dialling the number. 

“Who is this?” 

“Major Berenice Wolfe, formerly of the SOE stationed in Paris. You are…?”

“Major Grant Sanderson.” The gruff voice on the end of the line sounded marginally warmer. “Major Wolfe, this is a secure line and I’m unsure how you found this number… I’m afraid I’m going to have to-"

Bernie cut in. “Sir, I need to request some information about the situation in Clydebank.”

There was a long pause, and then Major Sanderson’s voice came back, tinged with regret. “I’m sorry, I can’t-” he sighed. “Major Wolfe, at this time, official policy is not to give any information about any events which may have occurred in the past few nights.”

Bernie hissed, under her breath, and Serena glanced sideways from where she was leaning against Bernie, listening in to the conversation. 

“My name and rank is Major Berenice Griselda Wolfe,” Bernie said, precisely enunciating each word. “My serial number is 3492-1123. I served in Paris under the auspices of the Special Operations Executive, between 1935 and 1940. I was invalided out from a bullet wound received in the service of Britain. I am now working as co-lead of the trauma ward at the hospital here in Clydebank. I would like information on the events of the last few days, so that I may better care for any servicemen who arrive here.”

Major Sanderson sighed again. “I understand your position, Major Wolfe, but I’m bound by official wartime policy: the War Ministry has decreed that all information about the events in Clydebank should be deemed classified until further notice.” 

“Can you tell me how many were killed?” Bernie asked, and her fingers flexed involuntarily around the pen, tied to the bench by a string. 

“I’m sorry, I can’t.” 

“Can you tell me how many injured? This hospital is above capacity as it is and it’s a public safety issue, if we’re to be expected to take more patients on.” 

“I’m sorry, Major Wolfe.” 

“Can you tell me whether reinforcements are to be expec-”

_Click._ The phone went dead. Bernie felt a sudden, heady rush of fury, and she restrained it with an immense force of will, placing the phone back on its receiver with a precise, economical gesture. 

Serena glanced sideways, and her face immediately clouded over. 

“Nothing?” 

“Nothing,” Bernie replied, and Serena’s eyes flashed with rage. She reached over and pulled the phone from its receiver, dialling another number with shaking fingers.

“They can’t be allowed to get away with this,” she muttered against Bernie’s shoulder, head turned away from the phone to avoid the person on the other end hearing her words. She turned away: the phone had begun to ring on the receiving end. 

Bernie listened in, ear pressed to the other side of the phone. 

“Hello?” a male voice, sounding harassed. 

“Doctor Serena Campbell at Clydebank General Hospital,” Serena said brusquely. “I’d like to talk to Colonel Lethbridge, please. I believe he’s still working with you.”

“Hold, please.”

Serena turned to Bernie, holding her fingers up to show her they were crossed. _Let’s hope this works,_ she mouthed, and Bernie crossed her own fingers in reply.

“Doctor Campbell?” another male voice, calmer than the first, and Serena smiled slightly. 

“Colonel,” she said warmly. “I’m glad you’re still here; the SOE wouldn’t be the same without you.” 

The colonel hummed slightly down the telephone line. “Yes, well,” he said wryly. “Losing you was a big enough shock. I couldn’t deprive the war effort of my presence as well.” 

Bernie rolled her eyes a little, edging slightly into Serena’s shoulder, and Serena grinned, private and full of promise.

“Actually, I have a request,” Serena said, letting the words out gradually, as if she was trying not to scare him off. 

Colonel Lethbridge made another sort of low hum, and Serena continued, “You may be aware that Clydebank has been under attack in the past few days-”

Another hum. 

“As you know, I’m the co-lead of the trauma unit at Clydebank Hospital, along with Major Berenice Wolfe, also formerly of the SOE. We’re currently above our capacity on all wards of this hospital, and it’s likely that more patients will be brought in over the next few days. It would be ideal if we could receive some information about the bombings in Clydebank - the extent of the damage, the number of possible casualties we might expect to receive, the number of possible fatalities from the blasts themselves…”

There was a long pause on the other end of the phone line, and Bernie crossed her fingers tighter. Colonel Lethbridge sighed. 

“Serena… I’d do a lot for you and Major Wolfe,” he said sadly. “But with the blitz in London still ongoing, the War Office has decided…” he took an audible breath, and continued as Bernie leaned closer to the telephone receiver: “The War Office has decided that information cannot be made public about recent events in Clydebank. For reasons of public morale.”

Serena jerked backwards, phone receiver smacking gently against Bernie’s ear. Bernie turned to her, and realised that her eyes were dark and heated with anger. Bernie brought a hand up - slowly, gently - to caress the side of her shoulder, and she took a deep breath.

“That does a disservice to the people of this town, Colonel Lethbridge,” Serena said, a little too steadily. 

“God dammit Serena, I know it does,” he said, so low Bernie could barely hear him. “What can I do? I can’t contravene War Office orders.”

Serena paused. Steeled herself. Spoke. “I suspect the newspapers would be very interested in first-hand experiences of the events in Clydebank.”

Bernie’s gasp of shock at Serena’s guts was harsh in the cold room, and Serena leaned against her, stroking the hand still clasped around her shoulder with cool fingers.

There was another long pause on the end of the phone line. 

“That’s a very serious threat, Dr Campbell,” Colonel Lethbridge said eventually. “I can’t, of course, officially confirm anything, but I have no doubt the Nautical Star will be in touch.” 

Beside her, Bernie was amazed to realise that Serena was smiling, bright and satisfied. 

“I understand your predicament, Colonel Lethbridge,” she said, a false note of disappointment in her voice. “I won’t take up any more of your time.” 

She put the phone down slowly, and grinned up at Bernie as it clicked to end the call. 

“What d’you think of that, then?” she asked, as Bernie gaped. 

Bernie stuttered, gazing down at her, reluctant to move away from her warmth, the tingle where their bodies brushed each other. “What’s the Nautical Star?” she asked slowly. 

Serena pulled up her cuff. “This,” she said, holding her wrist out to Bernie, the small five-pointed star stark against pale skin. 

Bernie blushed hot, and Serena grinned, both women remembering the feel of Bernie’s lips against her wrist where her blood pounded, hot and desperate, just underneath her skin.

“But it’s also a codeword Lethbridge and I used while I was in Paris,” Serena continued, voice shaking only a little as Bernie grasped her wrist, tracing the star once again with her cool fingers. “It means he’ll get in contact with me as soon as he can."

“You-” Bernie muttered, eyes affixed to the tiny star, and she brought it to her mouth and kissed it again, lips moving ghostly over the ink. Serena made a noise in answer, deep in her throat, and blushed when she realised how real, how truthful, she’d accidentally been.

Serena cleared her throat, and Bernie took her mouth away from her wrist, blushed scarlet when she tried to meet Serena’s eyes. 

“Stay with me tonight,” Serena said, voice casual, eyes dark. 

Bernie stuttered, desperate, hopeful. 

“Your flat’s been bombed,” Serena said. “You need somewhere to stay.”

Bernie nodded, tried to speak. Nodded again. 

Serena smiled, and reached up to kiss Bernie just at the corner of her jaw before she turned, opening the door and leaving the room in a rush.

 

 

“Call for you, Ms Wolfe!” Rushing from the telephone room in the early evening, Morven nearly bumped into a line of currently occupied beds in her haste to reach Bernie, who was administering some of the hospital’s dwindling supply of pain relief to a patient. 

“Who is it?” Bernie called across the ward, eyes fixed on the patient’s IV line. 

Morven reached Bernie’s side and whispered, “Says he’s Major Sanderson - mean anything to you?” 

“You finish this,” Bernie said, “and not a word to anyone.” 

Morven glanced up: Bernie’s eyes were fierce and searching, and she nodded without argument. 

“This is Major Berenice Wolfe,” she said imperiously, a few seconds later as she picked the phone up from where it had been placed, perpendicular to its receiver. 

“Mmm, well,” Major Sanderson said, and his gruff voice vibrated with barely-controlled anger. 

“What’s going on?” Bernie asked, and she folded one arm under the other, settling her weight on one hip. 

“Major, I don’t know what you and your friends have been doing, but Clydebank military headquarters have just received a very unpleasant call from the War Office.” 

Bernie’s eyebrows shot up. “What?” 

“Yes,” the Major said. “It’s caused a lot of trouble here.” 

“I’m sorry if I’ve caused you any trouble,” Bernie said slowly. “That was never my intention…” 

Sanderson sighed, and it sounded like any large man’s sigh, deflated by the stress and exhaustion which the war was imposing upon everyone. 

“Look, Major Wolfe,” he said, “I admire you. You did damn good work in Paris, and this whole Clydebank business is an ill wind that blows no good. I know you want to help people, but you absolutely must stop nosing around for information.” 

Bernie felt the blood rushing away from her face. “Why the hell should I do that?” 

Sanderson’s voice dropped. “Because the War Office wants me to tell you to keep out of it entirely. The War Office phoned us asking us why the hell we hadn’t kept you in line.” 

The blood rushed back to Bernie’s face and she felt dizzy, rage-fuelled. 

“You need to be more careful,” Sanderson said, and Bernie bit back on her instinctive hiss of anger.

“Did they tell you what the consequences would be?” She fought to keep her voice light, ironic, but it cracked a little and the rage bled through.

“All they said is that your discharge isn’t fully complete. I am sorry,” Sanderson said, and he sounded genuinely apologetic. “Your friend was mentioned too. It isn’t good to poke your nose in official business, SOE or no.”

Bernie’s vision blurred, suffused with red, and she growled something down the phone and hung up, leaning her head against the wall, panting to catch her breath.

Then she turned away, stalking from the room. When she found Serena, finishing up paperwork in their office, she knocked on the door and leaned against it, gazing affectionately at her bowed head with its dark, glossy hair.

“Home?” she asked, when Serena looked up. 

 

 

Serena’s flat was dark when they let themselves in, and Bernie spared just enough presence of mind to hang her coat and hat up neatly by the door before walking to the living room sofa and collapsing on it. A few seconds later the sofa dipped beside her as Serena also sat down, legs and shoulders pressed hot against Bernie. 

“I’m too tired for dinner,” Bernie mumbled, massaging her eyeballs with one hand. 

Serena hummed nearly inaudibly, and then cleared her throat. “Me too. God. It’s been a long day.” 

Bernie nodded without taking her head off the sofa. There was a long pause, and then Serena slid a little closer, laying her head gently on Bernie’s shoulder, and Bernie felt her warmth against her entire side. She moved one hand closer to Serena, seeking Serena’s fingers in suddenly-shy movements. Their fingers entwined, and Bernie stifled her pleased, silly smile. And then Serena kissed her on the jaw, head moving only a little, as if she wouldn’t notice, and Bernie was unable to stifle her ragged breath. Serena kissed her again, and Bernie turned towards her, taking in at a glance her burning eyes, her tongue darting out to wet her lips, and Bernie’s self control was lost and she kissed Serena properly.

Their lips slid together as if they had been born to it, easy and instinctual and right, in some odd, fundamental sense Bernie decided to analyse later. They kissed and kissed, hands clasping each other by shoulders and waists in an effort to get closer, closer… Serena gasped into the kiss, as if overcome by want, and Bernie screwed her eyelids tighter shut against the wave of desire that threatened to overwhelm her, and then she slid her fingers just under the curve of Serena’s breast, over her rough cotton shirt, a light, tentative touch.

“Oh,” Serena muttered, in the liminal space between air and lips. 

Bernie’s fingers skittered away, unsure if she was allowed, but Serena pulled away from the kiss only to mutter again in that grated-thin voice, “Yes - yes, Bernie.”

So Bernie slid the finger back, tracking its movement across the warm, heavy weight of Serena’s breast, and when she dragged it slowly over her nipple Serena shuddered, looking suddenly stunned, as if her entire world view had abruptly and almost inexplicably altered. Bernie grinned, cradling Serena’s breast in her hand, moving with slow kisses down the unbuttoned neck of her collar. The skin she found was hot, trembling slightly with the force of Serena’s breath, and Bernie closed her eyes, thanking any gods who might still be out there as she found her way by touch alone. She got as far as the edge of Serena’s bra - skin warm, Serena’s musky, cinnamon scent as potent here as she’d ever yet discovered it - before a gentle hand at her jaw moved her upwards, and she opened her eyes and gazed at Serena.

Serena was panting slightly, and she gazed at Bernie with feverish eyes as she said, “There’s a bed over there.” 

Bernie blushed, despite what she’d just been doing, but slid off the sofa in a tangle of limbs and extended a hand to Serena who turned gracefully on her feet, leading them to the door of her bedroom, only a few metres away.

“Are you sure?” Bernie said softly, able to focus on little more than the soft, graceful arc of Serena’s neck in front of her and her waist, curving deliciously underneath her rough cotton shirt.

Serena flicked the light on, started undoing the buttons of her shirt. “I’m sure,” she said, and Bernie felt lost and found, equally and at the same time. 

Two minutes later Bernie won the struggle to pull her stockings off, and dumped them somewhere over the other side of her bed. She looked up: Serena was standing gazing at her in her underwear, graceful and utterly confident, an amused look on her face.

“What?” Bernie asked, a little defensive. 

“You’re a -” Serena paused to choke down laughter. “You’re a surgeon and a spy but your stockings are too much for you?!”

Bernie huffed, but smiled slightly at Serena’s fond, adoring look - and then she glimpsed the funny side of the entire situation and started laughing as well. She reached out to Serena, pulling her close, feeling the muscles over her ribs contract with her continued laughter. Serena kissed her, letting little snorts of laughter gust against her mouth before pulling her down onto the bed. Bernie hovered over Serena, sprawled out elegantly, beautifully, against the worn bedspread, and felt suddenly overwhelmed. Serena locked their gazes, dark eyes blown wide as she reached for one of Bernie’s hands and placed it determinedly on a breast. 

“It’s alright, Bernie,” she said softly. “I want you more than anything,” and Bernie felt desire, visceral and immediate, run through her at the familiar words, and she traced the vein running blue towards Serena’s nipple. 

“Can I -” she said, and Serena lifted herself a little off the bed to reach for the clasp of her bra, pulling it off and discarding it haphazardly. Serena’s breasts were full, weighing heavily in Bernie’s hands, and Serena’s shuddered gasp as Bernie flicked her thumbs across the nipples might have been the most erotic thing Bernie had ever heard. She reached down and licked the right nipple experimentally, revelling in Serena’s half-stifled noises. In response Serena pulled at Bernie, seeking increased contact a little desperately, hands fluttering over her hips, buttocks, up her back, under the band of her bra, and Bernie muttered, mouth still full of Serena’s breast, “Take it off.” 

It took a few goes for Serena to unhook Bernie’s bra, but her hands were shaking, and Bernie didn’t mind. At the first drag of nipples against nipples Serena threw her head back and groaned, as loud as she dared, and Bernie felt helpless to do anything other than kiss her way down that long, extended neck. And then Serena cupped Bernie’s breasts in her hands, studying them, touching them with intense concentration, and when Bernie moaned, quietly and completely outside of her own control, she felt as though all her secrets were being taken from her, one by one, until nothing was left.

In a sudden rush of panic Bernie slid her hand downwards, across the taut expanse of Serena’s stomach, until she reached the edge of her pants, where she slid a couple of fingers underneath the elastic band. 

“… Oh,” Serena gasped, elated as if Bernie had shown her all her secrets.

“Can I?” Bernie asked softly, and Serena nodded, lust-wide eyes fixed on Bernie. 

Bernie pulled Serena’s underpants down, and Serena herself kicked them off. Serena’s cinnamon, musky scent filled the air, as she reached for Bernie, pulling her down and kissing her fiercely. Bernie threaded her fingers towards Serena’s centre, parting her lips and finding her shockingly, vividly drenched. As Bernie stroked two fingers up the sides of Serena’s clit Serena pulled away from the kiss to gasp once again into the silent room. 

“I never,” she muttered, as Bernie coated her fingers luxuriantly, greedily, in her wetness, kissing hungrily at her jawline. “I never knew - oh God!” Bernie slipped a finger inside, feeling Serena’s inner walls pulse, pulling her in further, and she slipped another finger in and began a slow, deliberate rhythm that soon had Serena clenching around her fingers, hands scrabbling to find purchase against the sheets. Her thumb passed over Serena’s clit, slow at first and then faster as Serena’s quiet moans grew more urgent, and then Bernie bit down, unexpected and painful, on the tender skin under Serena’s jaw, near her ear, and Serena came with a stifled shriek, legs spasming against the disarrayed sheets. 

She panted, loud, unashamed, for several minutes while she caught her breath, whole body shuddering with the aftershocks, and Bernie gentled her through it, fingers still buried within her, other hand stroking her sides, her thighs, her perfect, beautiful breasts. When she had calmed Bernie pulled her fingers out, licking experimentally at the wetness that coated them. 

“Oh God.” Serena had opened her eyes, and was gazing at Bernie with something like awe. “I never knew…” she trailed off, and Bernie kissed her, forgetting that Serena would be able to taste herself on Bernie’s tongue. 

When they broke the kiss Serena said softly, voice full of wonder, “I could taste…” and Bernie blushed. 

“Sorry,” she said, wiping at her lips, embarrassed, but Serena shook her head. 

“I want to-” she gestured a little, and Bernie’s eyes widened. 

“You don’t have to,” she said, but Serena trailed a hand over her breast, catching her nipple briefly, and Bernie’s sharp intake of breath betrayed her desire. Serena wriggled out from under Bernie, pushing Bernie gently back against the bed, and smiled, warm and anticipatory as she traced the path of Bernie’s underwear elastic across her hips. She pulled the underwear off quickly and not gently, but once it was off she sat for long moments, dark eyes taking in Bernie’s form. Under her analysing gaze Bernie became gradually shy, unable to fully meet her eyes, and eventually she blushed, embarrassed and frustrated at being embarrassed. She began to sit up. 

“No, don’t,” Serena said immediately, and reached out a hand to trace Bernie’s flank, her touch barely-there. Bernie lay back down. “I’ve never done this before,” Serena continued, and trailed off.

“On yourself?” Bernie asked quietly, and Serena shook her head. 

“Not often.” 

Bernie stretched out a hand, wrapping her long fingers around Serena’s hand where it was still curled over her hip bone. “I’ll show you,” she said, patting the bed beside her, and Serena lay down on her side beside her. Bernie kissed her slowly, murmuring, “You’ve nothing to be nervous about,” in between her tiny, feather-light kisses, and eventually Serena smiled against her lips. Slowly, Bernie guided Serena’s fingers between her legs. Gradually, Serena began to take the initiative, surgeon’s fingers gliding precisely through Bernie’s gathering wetness, and to her acute embarrassment Bernie suddenly moaned, wanton in the stillness of the room. 

“Good?” Serena asked, voice low as if she was aroused by Bernie’s admission of desire.

“Inside,” Bernie grated out, as their legs tangled together. 

Serena slipped a finger inside Bernie, and it was worth all the awkwardness in the world to see her expression change, eyes suddenly wide with delight and understanding, and Bernie leaned up and kissed her fiercely as her other hand made its way to one of Bernie’s breasts. 

“More,” Bernie muttered against Serena’s lips, tangling her hands in Serena’s silky hair, and Serena added another finger as she sped up, thrusting into Bernie with a surety Bernie hadn’t realised she possessed.

“Oh God,” Bernie groaned, and closed her eyes when Serena crooked her fingers slightly, sending sparks and shivers down Bernie’s spine, shorting out her breath and making her gasp. Serena was kissing her way down Bernie’s throat, wrapping her lips around one of Bernie’s nipples and engulfing it in wet, liquid heat. And then Serena’s thumb slid, as if by accident, against the side of Bernie’s clit and Bernie groaned again, louder. 

“Good?” Serena asked again, around Bernie’s breast, and Bernie nodded. 

“Do - _ah!_ \- do that again.” 

And Serena did, sliding her thumb teasingly against Bernie’s clit as if she’d done this a thousand times, once, twice, and a third time, and then Bernie’s whole body stiffened and she screwed her eyelids shut, pulling on Serena’s short hair hard enough to hurt, and she came with a groan and an “Oh - _Serena -”_

It took some minutes for Bernie to come back to herself, and when she opened her eyes the first thing she saw was Serena, pulling the blankets up around them to ward off the chilly air. Bernie ran a lazy hand down Serena’s spine, tracing the protruding vertebrae with a smile, silly and fond. Serena turned to her with a look of slight apprehension. 

“Was that… alright?” she asked, and Bernie grinned, pulling her down to lie curled together. 

“Aye,” she said, too relaxed to cover her accent as she gently kissed Serena’s jawline. “Sleep. The morning will take care of itself.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bernie kissing Serena because of coffee is the kind of thing I’d do. Let’s be real here.  
> Ever since I saw it used (badly) in Twilight, I have a real thing for the word ‘irrevocably’. That being said, I can’t think of ‘irrevocably’ without thinking of Twilight, but be assured you’ll find no Edwards (Cullen or Campbell!) in this story!  
> 1940s lingerie wasn’t the weird Madonna-style cone bras of the 1950s (ain’t nobody got cloth enough for that!). It was pretty similar to what we have now, actually; less lace and condiments, obviously, but structurally fairly similar. Thank fuck, honestly; I don’t have a clue how 1950s style underwear works.


	9. Reassigned

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "If it's what you want, I wouldn't - well, I couldn't stand in your way, but..."

The next morning, Bernie woke early. A long triangle of foggy grey light was spread across the floor, trickling in through the window where the heavy blackout curtains hadn’t been fully pulled. In the dawn’s cold light Serena looked especially beautiful, Bernie thought, sprawled half over Bernie with sleep’s luxurious abandon. Bernie wrapped her arm across Serena’s waist, careful not to disturb her but craving closeness. Serena let out a quiet snuffle, burrowing her face closer into Bernie’s shoulder, and Bernie smiled, heart full of love. Lying utterly still, she gazed down at Serena, eyes closed, face slack with sleep, and whispered the words she lacked the courage to say out loud.

“I love you.” 

Serena stirred a little, tightening her grip around Bernie’s waist, and slept on. Bernie dozed again, falling into a light sleep, and she dreamed of a hazy future after the war, of mornings like this stretching out into a possible forever, and when she woke she was already blinking back tears.

 

 

The hospital was frantically busy when they walked in, clutching mugs full of chicory coffee. Bernie was hyperaware of Serena’s presence beside her and trying hard not to show it. Her eyes kept straying towards Serena, walking calmly beside her and looking like she’d had a restful night’s sleep, not a trace of their real activities to be seen. 

They were walking up the long flight of stairs to the AAU when Serena paused, reaching out and taking hold of Bernie’s elbow to steer her towards a nearby landing. Serena stared at Bernie for a few long moments, and Bernie stared out the window, unable to fully meet Serena’s eyes. 

“Are you alright?” Serena finally asked, her tone gentle as if Bernie were a skittish colt, liable to run at any moment. 

Bernie nodded, and eventually found her voice. “I should be asking you that, I think.”

Serena smiled, reaching for Bernie’s hand against the wall and intertwining their fingers where they wouldn’t be seen. “Last night was… well,” she came to a halt and blushed. “It was wonderful. But it also feels like it was the first thing that’s made sense since I came back from Paris. It felt right, like it was maybe the most honest thing I’ve ever done.” 

Bernie stared, overwhelmed by Serena’s honesty, and Serena raised an eyebrow, gaze steady. 

“It felt honest for me too,” Bernie said eventually, trying not to stutter.

“And, you know,” Serena looked down at their hands, curled together unseen by the wall, and then she looked up at Bernie, gaze naked, stripped of all pretence. “I have been in love before. I do know the symptoms.”

Bernie felt her heartbeat pound in her ears as she parsed Serena’s words. Her panic must have shown in her face, because Serena smiled, placing a finger over her own lips as she said, “You don’t have to say anything. I just wanted to tell you, that’s all.”

Bernie nodded, mind a turmoil of emotions, thumb rubbing circles over the back of Serena’s hand, and at Serena’s nod she turned and they began walking towards the ward. But the memory of her confession, whispered to Serena’s sleeping form earlier that morning, tugged at her, and she grimaced, filled with an odd sense of guilt.

 

 

“Ms Wolfe!” Morven called, raising her voice over the ward’s lunchtime hubbub.

Bernie turned around, halting her brisk walk out the ward doors, and stifled a sigh as Morven raced up to her. “What is it, then?”

To her surprise, Morven started stammering. “It’s, well,” she said, lowering her voice so Bernie had to lean close to hear. “It’s someone from the Army; says they’re from the camp outside Glasgow and would Major Wolfe please come to the ‘phone immediately. I didn’t want to call you over the intercom, but the phone call is still active.” 

Bernie frowned, puzzled, but started walking immediately to the telephone room. “You’ve done the right thing, Morven, thanks,” she said over her shoulder, and closed the phone room door behind her. 

“Hello?” 

“Is this Major Wolfe?” A gruff male voice, probably used to commanding authority. 

“This is Doctor Wolfe,” Bernie said levelly. “I’ve been discharged from the Special Operations Executive.” 

“That’s why I’m calling, Major Wolfe,” the voice said. “I’m Lieutenant-General Murdoch with the SOE. You’re being transferred.” 

Bernie felt a pit opening up underneath her, and she pulled the phone away from her head and stared at it for a moment in disbelief. 

“You can’t do that,” she said, her voice flat. “I’ve been discharged. And I’m needed here.”

“We can, and we have,” Murdoch said. “Your discharge papers weren’t finalised when you came back from Paris, and there’s a greater need for you at the SOE training camp. You’ll be training the new recruits in field medicine. It’s a wonderful opportunity.”

“But in light of the recent bombings in Clydebank-” Bernie said, and then she interrupted herself, more enraged than she’d ever been. “That’s what this is about, isn’t it? My colleague and I were trying to _help people,_ you jumped-up, bureaucratic twat, and you’ve turned it political.”

There was a pause on the other end of the line, and when Murdoch spoke, his voice was stiff, shaking slightly with rage. “Your colleague’s threat to go to the newspapers put national security at risk. That is unacceptable, Major Wolfe, do you understand? Now - you have your orders. Take the seventeen-hundred hours train to Bellahouston today; someone will meet you there. Good day to you.” And the phone was slammed down. 

Bernie stared at the receiver in her hands for several long minutes until someone started hammering on the door to the room. She put the phone down, walked out of the room, barely noticing who needed the phone room after her, and walked off the ward. How _dare_ they call her back to the SOE; how _dare_ they punish her and Serena for trying to help people, for trying to save lives, and - oh God - Serena. Bernie’s thoughts stuttered to a halt as she pushed the door to the roof open, and she sat down heavily on a nearby pipe. She’d have to leave Serena. Her heart clenched painfully in her chest and she reached for her box of cigarettes, tucked into a pocket. Two left, and she pulled one out and lit it carefully, taking a long, deliberate drag before she let herself think of Serena again.

She couldn’t tell Serena why she was being called back, she realised slowly. If Serena knew, she’d go to the newspapers, and questions would be asked; their relationship might become known, and then they’d both be finished, unable to get jobs ever again, shunned by their colleagues and friends… Bernie shook her head. Telling Serena was out of the question. She’d simply have to come up with some kind lie, something that would make Serena hate her, make her glad to see her leave. She rested her elbows on her knees and scrubbed at her eyes with one hand, surprised to see tears glistening on her fingers when she looked down. She thought of how generous and kind Serena had been ever since Bernie had arrived from London, how glorious, how beautiful Serena had looked last night when they were making love, how Serena had implied only that morning that she was in love with Bernie, and she put her head down on her hands and wept, huge, racking sobs that drove the breath from her lungs and left her shaking and gasping for air. After a few minutes she tried to pull herself together, sniffling loudly and wiping at her eyes with both hands, the cigarette lying forgotten and guttering out on the concrete roof beside her. But the memory of Serena’s dark eyes gazing at her while she brought her off last night swam into her mind’s eye and Bernie burst into tears again, embarrassed and grief-stricken and ashamed. 

She let herself cry until she could cry no more and she felt shivering and weak, mouth parched from the loss of fluid, eyes red and swollen. After a while she forced herself to stand up, to open the door back into the hospital and to find one of the bathrooms off the staircase landings. She splashed her entire face in freezing-cold water, breath uneven and jagged from the shock of the cold. She held her palms, doused in water, over her eyes, hoping to reduce the swelling, but when she gazed at herself in the mirror her eyes were just as red, devastated and watering at the corners, and eventually she shrugged and gave up. She patted her face dry. And then she walked back downstairs, onto the AAU and into their office, closing the door behind her. 

Serena looked up at her from her desk and smiled, and it nearly broke her resolve entirely.

“I’ve been looking for you,” Serena said. “Morven said you got a ‘phone call but I wasn’t able to find you after that…” Her face changed at the sight of Bernie’s red eyes, her voice trailed off and she stood up from her chair, moving towards Bernie, hands outstretched.

Bernie flung up a hand, warding her off.

“I got a phone call from the SOE training camp, outside of Glasgow,” she said, and she didn’t meet Serena’s eyes. “I’ve been reassigned.”

Serena stopped dead, standing utterly still, and when Bernie finally glanced towards her she felt scorched by the look in her eyes. 

“But… you were discharged,” Serena said stupidly. “They can’t do that.” 

“They can,” Bernie said, affecting an air of nonchalance she didn’t feel, hating herself more every minute. “My discharge was never finalised. And besides, it’s a fantastic opportunity. I’ve been wanting to get back into the field.”

Her voice cracked, just a little, on the last word and she hoped to any deity out there that Serena hadn’t noticed it. Serena moved a little closer, eyes fixed on Bernie. 

“If it’s what you really want,” she said slowly, “I wouldn’t - well. I couldn’t stand in your way. But…” Her gaze flickered down to Bernie’s lips, just for a second, and she swayed, mouth within a hairsbreadth of Bernie’s, and it took all of Bernie’s considerable self-control not to close the gap, kiss her, confess the deception.

Bernie stepped back, picking up her coat from her nearby chair. “Well,” she said brightly, hating her false tone, “I have to hand my resignation in to Mr Hanssen.” 

Serena grabbed her by the sleeve as she turned away. “Tell me you want this job,” she said, low and angry, “and I’ll let you go. Tell me you don’t love me - I heard you this morning, I heard what you said when you thought I was asleep - and I’ll walk you off the hospital premises myself.”

Bernie’s feet seemed unable to move. She tried to walk away, tried to get away from this woman who knew her better than she knew herself, but they stayed planted on the office carpet, and somewhere in her mind she wondered if this was an out of body experience or if she’d finally lost her mind entirely. Eventually, she gave up. 

“I can’t,” she said, so softly she wasn’t sure Serena heard. “I can’t tell you that.” And then she realised she could move her feet and she opened the door and walked away and didn’t look back, even when she saw Raf and Morven staring at her red eyes and shameful, shameful tears, even when she heard Serena come barrelling out of the office behind her, even when she knew Serena was in tears behind her and her, “No! _Please!_ ” tore Bernie’s heart out of her chest, leaving her struggling for air and unable to control her weeping.

She walked out of the hospital, left her bicycle chained up beside Serena’s, and walked to the train station. The idea of retrieving her belongings from Serena’s flat was impossible, and what little else she possessed had been bombed to smithereens in the Kilbowie Road, and ultimately, she realised, she no longer cared. She no longer cared about anything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My poor poor darlings :'(
> 
> Edit: I should add, today (14th March) is the 76th anniversary of the Blitz in Clydebank. May all who died those days rest in eternal peace.


	10. Exile

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bernie makes a decision.

Two weeks later.

“… If a soldier is wounded in your unit in the field, your main problem is going to be what…” Bernie paused for a moment, staring her class down, before whipping her head around and pointing at a slim young man in SOE uniform, “Owen?” 

The young man named Owen frowned. “Am I under active bombardment, ma’am?”

Bernie nodded. “Your unit is cut off from any other Résistance members with whom you may be working. You’re hidden from the Germans’ direct line of sight and one of your troops has been shot, but not fatally. What do you do?”

“Put pressure on the wound, ma’am?” Owen asked. Another officer, a pretty young woman with curly hair and a steely smile, rolled her eyes, and Owen amended hastily, “Delegate one person to put pressure on the wound and keep the wounded soldier quiet, keep up offensive or defensive tactics against the Germans, and get back to base as soon as possible.” 

The female officer grinned, eyes bright with mischief and clearly dying to speak. Bernie said, “Good answer, Owen. In general, anything more serious than applying a tourniquet shouldn’t be attempted in the field. Are there any exceptions to this…” and this time Bernie pointed at the female officer, “Nancy?” 

The other members of the class sat up slightly. Nancy already had several years of experience fighting the Nazis in France, and she had become something of a legend in the SOE. 

Nancy crossed her legs, leaning back in her chair a little. “This one time,” she drawled in a slight Australian accent, “we were meant to be undercover but, I don’t know, something had gone wrong and we were ambushed. A friend of mine took a bullet in the arm and had to dress it in a toilet cubicle on the train on our way to our stop. Fortunately we managed to patch up his jacket so the wound didn’t show and we completed our mission, but it was a near miss, I’ll tell you that.”

Bernie smiled as the other members of the class hooted in near-disbelief.

“Settle down, settle down,” she said calmly. “Thank you for that, Nancy.” 

“You know it happened, ma’am,” Nancy protested, as the class broke into another peal of laughter, but there was no real heat behind Nancy’s protests, and she grinned, sly and conspiratorial, at Bernie, as she settled back into her chair. 

 

 

After class, Bernie pulled on her raincoat and walked back to her barracks in silence, arms filled with books and diagrams she’d used for class. It had been a long two weeks, she thought slowly, eyes fixed on the rudimentary boardwalk connecting the various buildings in the camp as she walked carefully, trying not to slip in the rain and ruin her books. The night she arrived she had been met at the train station by an eager young officer who had driven her to the camp, given her a simple supper, and shown her to her barracks.She had cried on the train, and her eyes were red and puffy when the officer had met her, but he had refrained from comment, and it had helped, somehow; the military life was a world she understood, and lying in her uncomfortable bed that first night she had gazed up at the ceiling and sworn not to cry again. Not for Serena, who deserved so much more than Bernie, anxious and terrified beneath her competent exterior. Not for Alex, either, whose lifeblood had drained out in Bernie’s arms, who Bernie had been unable to save. And most of all, not for herself: what had happened with Serena and Alex was nothing more than a failure of will, Bernie knew; and she had thought she’d put that behind her, so very many years earlier. Bernie sighed as she reached her barracks, and when she entered her spartan room she set the books down gently and sat down on the hard bed, staring aimlessly into space. 

She no longer cried, but her dreams had taken on a mind of their own and they presented her, every night, with a roster of regrets: Serena’s dark eyes, widened in both pleasure and grief; Alex’s lips, and the way the colour drained from her face as she bled out, a German bullet lodged in her chest; the green eyes of her roommate from Cambridge as she reached to trace Bernie’s cheekbone, touch hesitant, electric… Bernie shook her head slightly. She thought she’d forgotten about Elizabeth, how deeply she’d fallen in love and how afraid they’d both been. Bernie had only recently stopped attending the kirk in Clydebank, and for some weeks every time Elizabeth had reached for her she’d shivered, turned away. Eventually she’d told Elizabeth what the minister had said, voice booming from the pulpit, and how her father had nodded along with the sermon, how over their Sunday lunch her father had burst into a long diatribe about ‘unnatural women’ and how Bernie should be careful, should watch out for their wiles… and how afraid Bernie had been, how convinced she’d been that everyone knew. Elizabeth had been silent for a long time, and just as Bernie had been about to move away, in fear or embarrassment, she’d spoken up. 

“I think he’s wrong, Bernie,” she’d said, and Bernie had gaped at her, mouth open in astonishment. She’d glanced up, meeting Bernie’s eyes. “I don’t see how something that brings this much… this much joy, this much love, could ever be anything less than holy and right.” 

Bernie had been unable to form a reply for several long minutes. And then, “But what about Leviticus?” 

“It doesn’t say anything about people like us,” Elizabeth had replied, and she slid her hand into Bernie’s, tangling their fingers together. Bernie’s grip had tightened involuntarily, but Elizabeth held on, not letting go.

Bernie thought the verse over again in her mind, the verse to which the minister and her father had referred with vitriol in their voices and a mad gleam in their eyes. “It doesn’t,” she said slowly. “I don’t know why I never saw that.” 

This time, when Elizabeth leaned closer, Bernie didn’t pull away, and the softness of Elizabeth’s lips was a revelation in itself.

And then, somehow - Bernie was still unsure exactly how - Elizabeth’s parents had found out about their relationship. Members of the minor nobility with pretensions to better things, they had been horrified that their daughter had been involved, not only with a middle-class Scot - from industrial Glasgow! - but also with a woman. Elizabeth had been rapidly removed from Cambridge and married off, within the space of a summer. Somehow, Bernie’s parents had also found out - had the noble parents deigned to write to the grubby, industrial Scottish parents? - and she had been confronted with a letter explaining in a few taut words that she’d been disinherited, disowned, and she should not bother coming back. 

Well then.

Bernie had decided that such happiness as she’d experienced with Elizabeth was probably more than she could reasonably expect to feel, and so she’d vowed to keep her head down, to focus on her work, and - above all - to avoid any further lapses of discipline. And so far - momentary lapses notwithstanding - she’d been reasonably successful. 

Bernie’s eyes refocused on the facing wall, unpainted and grim in the barrack’s half-light. She lifted a hand to her face and was distantly shocked to note the wetness of tears on her cheeks. Odd, she thought. She used to be able to think of Elizabeth without emotion, as though those sun-lit days of laughter and conversation and kisses had happened to someone else entirely. She remembered suddenly the golden haze of light that had shone around Serena’s dark hair, the second night of the Blitz, as Serena had stood in the door to her bedroom and beckoned her in - and a wave of longing and grief washed over her. She dug her nails into her forearm, feeling the jolt of pain with vicious satisfaction, and when fresh tears threatened she dug her nails in again, until the pressure behind her eyes disappeared and she blinked away the blurriness in her vision. She swiped a hand under her eyes and stood up. Hopefully, she thought to herself with a kind of grim despair, somewhere, there was work to be done.

 

 

Three weeks later.

Bernie placed her coffee cup gently on the canteen table, before sitting down on the hard bench with a thump. She took a long swig from her coffee/chicory mixture, closing her eyes against the memories brought by the smell wafting up from the hot mug. She sighed.

“Long day, Major Wolfe?” 

Bernie looked up, cracking open an eye and glaring at the newcomer, who was tucking in to his dinner with undisguised gusto. He was a large man, muscular, not yet gone to seed, with cheeks roughened by the wind. Bernie woke up a little and extended a hand across the table.

“The longest,” she said ruefully, “or at least, one of the longest.”

“Major Griffin,” the man said, smiling as he shook her hand. “Ric Griffin. I hope that coffee is helping?”

“It’s helping some,” she said, looking down at her now half-empty cup. “I heard you were coming in to take a workshop on codes?”

“That’s right,” he said. “Just for the next two days. I’ve brought a few of my top code-breakers, too. Should be an interesting few days, teaching your people how to avoid Boche interference.” 

He flashed a quick, sideways grin at her, so fast she nearly missed it. One side of her mouth quirked up, a reflexive gesture, but there was no real feeling behind it and maybe he noticed, because his mouth softened into a smile, genuine and friendly.

“Hey,” he said softly, “I don’t know why you’re here in this sad old training camp. You’re a legend in the SOE, you know that? Something must have happened to land you here with the rest of us washed-out old workhorses, and I’m betting it wasn’t because you got burnt out.”

Bernie nodded, startled to feel tears welling up in her eyes, and she looked down at her coffee cup in embarrassment. 

“You ever want to talk about it,” he continued, “I’m here, okay?” He craned his neck to catch her eye from where she was staring down into her coffee cup, and she gave him a small smile.

“Thanks,” she said quietly, “but -”

"Doctor Bernie?” The voice was familiar, cutting through the canteen hubbub like a razorblade, and Bernie tensed immediately, unable to look up, unable to meet the eyes of the person she knew would be standing near the table. In front of her, she was aware that Major Griffin was staring at her, gaze assessing her reaction, and after a long pause she heard him speaking in a low tone.

“But Doctor Bernie is good friends with my aunt,” a plaintive voice said.

“Major Wolfe has had a long day,” Major Griffin said, and it was the note of understanding and patient reassurance in his voice that galvanised her into action. She raised her head, looked the speaker in the eye. 

“Hello Jason,” she said.

 

 

Ten minutes later.

“I don’t understand why you had to leave Auntie Serena, though,” Jason said loudly as they walked towards the camp’s training fields.

“Keep your voice down,” Bernie hissed, glancing around, wondering if anyone was in earshot.

“Why?” Jason had stopped walking, and he was standing on the outskirts of the field, hands shoved deep in his pockets against the coolness of the night. Bernie felt a sudden surge of affection as she walked back towards him from where she had continued walking when he had stopped. She paused, deep in thought, and after a few minutes he said again, “Why, Doctor Bernie?” 

“I don’t know what your aunt has told you,” she eventually said slowly. “She was very… special to me, and many people find that unusual, or frightening, or morally wrong. It’s wiser not to tell people too much, not to invite questions. Does that make sense?”

Jason thought about it for a moment, then… “No,” he said. “It isn’t other people’s business what you do.” 

Bernie looked down at her hands, clasped in front of her, to hide her smile. “No,” she agreed. “Someone once told me that nothing that brought me as much happiness as your aunt gave me could ever be wrong, or sinful. I’ve had a hard time believing that, though.”

She felt Jason’s gaze on her, and forced herself to look up, meeting his eyes. He looked sadder than she’d ever seen him.

“I’ve gone home twice since you left,” he said quietly. “The first weekend I was home, she wouldn’t leave the flat at all. She cried all weekend. First she told me she didn’t understand why you left. Then, a few hours later, she told me that she knew you left because you didn’t care about her, no matter what you said. I don’t understand what happened, Doctor Bernie, and I don’t know what I can do to make it better.” 

He sounded desperate, and Bernie felt the hot prickle of tears behind her eyes as he gazed at her. She shook her head and looked away, too filled with shame to hold his gaze. 

“I can’t, Jason,” she muttered. “I made a big mistake, bigger than I realised - but I didn’t take this job willingly. I was reassigned because Serena threatened to tell the papers about the blitz in Clydebank, and the War Office thought that she might keep quiet if I were moved. I didn’t want to -” she cut herself off, and turned away, beginning the long walk across the darkened camp to her barracks.

“She misses you, I know she does!” Jason’s voice echoed across the fields behind her and she cursed, under her breath, as she turned back. 

“Then tell her I miss her,” Bernie said, and then she sighed, shoulders slumped in what felt hideously like defeat. “Tell her I miss her more than I could ever say.”

And then she turned around and walked back to her barracks, eyes lifted to the sky in a futile effort to stop her tears from falling.

 

 

A week later.

Another cup of coffee, another dreary day. 

Another class full of dedicated, raucous SOE officers eager to learn from the living legend that was Major Berenice Wolfe.

Another day that Bernie felt she was surviving, not living; eking out the lonely hours until she was either released from teaching duty or sent back on active duty. Another hour when the minutes passed slower than ever, as if they knew the bad she had done and the good she had failed to do.

Jason’s visit brought Bernie none of the peace she had hoped, eventually, to receive. The promise she’d made to herself not to cry had likewise failed, and she woke each morning to find her eyes red and puffy. She spent an inordinate amount of time running cold water over her hands, pressing her fingers to her eyes, but nothing could entirely eradicate the grief she carried within herself, like a stone lodged in her abdomen, heavy and reproachful. 

Slowly, the days passed. 

And then one day, when Bernie was sitting alone in the canteen, drinking a single cup of coffee in place of her usual breakfast, the mail came. 

“Letter for you, Major Wolfe.” The young SOE officer dropped it in front of Bernie and winked cheerfully.

She pulled it towards herself with an outstretched finger, too exhausted to fully open her eyes. The writing on the envelope was terrible, an untidy scrawl that reminded her of every doctor’s handwriting she’d ever seen - and her heartrate sped up. She ripped the envelope apart, pulling the letter out with hands that shook.

_Dear Bernie_ \- 

She set the letter flat on the table. Took a deep, steadying breath. Picked the letter up again. 

_Jason came to see me a few days ago. He says he talked with you while he was at the SOE camp. He says you seem well, that you’re enjoying your work._

_I have no idea what he told you - he refuses to say - but, in case he said nothing at all, the hospital is progressing in your absence, although AAU misses your steadying hand. After recent events_ (Bernie smiled; Serena was trying to avoid the wartime censor’s heavy hand) _we experienced something of a deluge of patients - it is truly a pity you missed it; your ‘Major Wolfe’ organising skills would not have gone amiss._

_Bernie, I’ve been struggling to discern how to finish this letter for some days. I’ve decided that we should both be honest - as honest as we possibly can be, and more. Since Jason left I’ve been consumed by two realisations: first, that my belief that you left willingly was wrong, and second, that I miss you. You are the most fantastic, fearless person I have ever known, and I need you to be fearless now more than ever. If you meant what you said the last morning you were in Clydebank - those words you whispered in my ear - come back. There will always be a place for you at this hospital and by my side._

_Serena_

Bernie wiped a tear away from where it had fallen onto the edge of the letter. She sat for a long time gazing at the letter, mind and heart racing, before she moved.

After a while - after a very long while - she folded the letter and placed it carefully in a pocket. She stood up, abandoning her coffee cup, and walked out of the canteen. She went to the administration block, barely noticing that the persistent drizzle of rain had finally let up. She made her way past the reception and the secretarial pool with a quick smile, knocked on a door, and walked in.

“Who is it?” a gruff voice called, and when she entered the office the soldier behind the desk looked up, his beetled eyebrows lowered. “Major, who gave you permis-”

She interrupted him, posture parade-ground perfect, eyes boring into his. “Lieutenant-General Murdoch, I resign.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Boche = slightly derogatory name for the Germans, used by (at least) the British and the French.


	11. Fearless

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It takes courage to go back to the scene of nightmares, knowing what you might find. It takes greater courage to go back to a nightmare where the future is still unwritten.

“What?” Murdoch’s eyebrows drew further over his eyes and he glared at her, his confusion evident. 

Bernie stood yet more upright, and repeated herself. “I’m resigning, sir. Effective immediately.”

Murdoch jerked upright behind his desk, a disjointed motion that caused his elbow to dislodge a stack of papers. He swore under his breath as he bent to pick them up, dumping them back onto his desk without looking, unblinking eyes fixed on Bernie. “Major,” he said, his tone harsh, martial, “you are not some civilian who can lightly dismiss your obligations. When you enlisted, you forfeited the right to resign, as if this were some ordinary secretarial or receptionist’s job!”

He paused, eyes scanning over Bernie, who met his gaze with a stare of her own, almost on the verge of insubordination. He sighed, then, moving a pen to one side as he sat back down, and folded his arms. 

“Alright, then,” he said, and he gestured, conciliatory, palms open, hands apart. “What’s brought this on?”

Bernie suppressed the urge to roll her eyes. “Nothing, sir - ” 

“Great,” he interrupted, hands now flattened against the desk in a gesture of finality. “Then I believe you have a class that should be waiting for - ”

“ - but I _am_ resigning, sir, as of now,” Bernie said, voice raised above his. 

“Your duty - ” he said forcefully, and something in Bernie cracked, and she spoke, maybe for the first time in her life, without thought, without her own internal censorship.

“My _duty_ , sir, was to serve my country, and I have done it _well_ ,” she said. “I gave up a promising medical career to join the SOE in ’35. I learned French. I made a life for myself in Paris before the Occupation. I joined the Resistance. I took a bullet in the back for Britain, sir, which is no more than I swore to do if it were necessary when I joined the SOE. I watched my partner bleed out in front of me from a bullet I was powerless to stop, and again - that was a possibility I knew might happen. But you took me from a place where I was _saving_ people, Lieutenant-General Murdoch; you took me away from the people who need me most. You could get anyone to teach these recruits field medicine; you don’t need me. But the Clydebank trauma unit, it needs me. _Serena Campbell_ needs me - ” and she realised that her heart felt lighter already, and she smiled, subtle at the corner of her mouth, as she carried on. “ - and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, being here these past few weeks, it’s that the SOE saved me from myself once, but it cannot save me again. Sir, it’s been an absolute pleasure and a privilege, serving with you, but now, my watch is ended, and _I resign._ ”

She unpinned the badges that denoted her rank insignia from her collar while he stood there, open-mouthed at her audacity, and she placed them gently onto his desk. She saluted, the movement as crisp as ever, and turned around, heading for the door. Past the door-jamb she turned back, aware of the enormity of her decision. Her rank-badges looked tiny and fragile, spilled across his desk, and for a second she regretted her choice, but the paper of Serena’s letter rustled as she put her hands in her pockets and she smiled, heart full of certainty, and she turned around once more and walked away.

 

 

Doctor Bernie Wolfe stepped off the train at the Clydebank train station and shivered, thrusting her hands into her pockets. It was a cool day in April and the sun was shining through the clouds and the light, persistent smirr. A thin rainbow shone in the sky away to the west, arcing over the shining ribbon of the Clyde river, and Bernie turned her face to it, closing her eyes and basking in the sun’s spring warmth.

Bernie glanced around the train station as she walked away from the train: the damage wrought by German bombs had been severe, and the masonry of the destroyed ticketing office had been left in heaping piles where it had fallen. But the train tracks had been speedily made safe after the bombing, and this was the most important thing, enabling Clydebank’s war factories to continue production. She paused before she stepped out of the train station and onto Chalmers St, leaning against one of the remaining walls of the station as she looked back towards the Clyde river. Columns of rich grey smoke were pouring from three distinct factories: John Brown’s, Singer’s and the Royal Ordnance Factory, and she smiled with an odd sense of pride. She belonged here, she thought to herself; despite the years she’d spent fleeing Clydebank, her childhood, and the sense of grief and perpetual rage which she had thought endemic to all Scots, she was finally home. She realised with a start that it had only been a few short weeks since she left: as if from a very long way away she remembered sinking to her knees on the Kilbowie Road, the morning after the first bombs fell. Today, leaning against one of the station walls, her fingers clenched at her side, feeling as if by muscle memory the Scottish dirt under her fingertips, the dirt she’d picked up, tried to clasp, felt trickle back to earth. She remembered Serena’s voice, calling her out of her grief, and the feeling of Serena’s arm around her back, lifting her, supporting her through the devastation. How quickly she had fallen in love with Serena, and how foolish it had been to think she could simply outrun it.

Bernie pushed herself off the train station wall, shaking her head to clear it, and started walking. The streets were largely deserted: ruined buildings everywhere stood much as they had on the last night of the Blitz, and it was clear that most residents had died or simply walked away, knowing that while the war continued there was little chance their homes could be repaired. Clydebank looked like a ghost town, like some of the abandoned villages she had walked through during the Exode in May and June 1940, after the French surrender when the north of France was empty and the south was filled with refugees fleeing to Britain, Africa, wherever they could go. Bernie and Alex, Marceau and Henri had joined the seething mass of people on the road, seeking information about the latest German movement and forming links with the nascent, organised Resistance. Clydebank reminded her of those empty villages, house doors left swinging open, half-eaten lunchtime baguettes left strewn across the kitchen table, the accoutrements of ordinary life scattered. Bernie passed once-proud buildings, utterly shattered, lying now in rubble, piled brick on brick to the sky. Here, tiny, blue-flowering weeds crept over the rubble, the bright cerulean of their petals a macabre testament to the calcium of the bones that lay beneath the bricks and cement. Bernie shuddered, and looked away. She thought of the kids she’d seen playing on the Kilbowie Road when she’d first arrived, but pulled her mind firmly away from any curiosity about their fate. No point wondering; she’d find out soon enough. 

And finally, the hospital loomed in front of her, its red brick facade welcoming and homely in its familiarity. She stood outside for a long moment, as her gaze was drawn to the roof, where she and Serena had shared so many post-surgery breaks. Was Serena there now, looking down at her, taking a long drag of her cigarette and letting it out slowly? Was Serena - and Bernie shook her head again, took a deep breath, and reached for the door.

The AAU, once she had walked across the hospital’s foyer, up the stairs and down long, familiar corridors, was busy and tense with energy. Bernie let the heavy ward door swing shut behind her, staring in pleased recognition at the pale green wallpaper, the beds lining the walls, and the nurse’s station with its red emergency telephone, stethoscopes, and… 

Raf looked up from his seat behind the nurse’s station. Bernie saw a split-second of disbelief in his eyes before he jumped up, pushing the chair backwards with a loud screech that echoed around the ward.

“ _Bernie_ ,” he said, and she smiled, a little tremulous. He grabbed her by her shoulders, staring wildly at her, taking in the military uniform she’d neglected to take off and the frown lines around her eyes that had seemed to develop overnight. “We thought you weren’t coming back,” he said in a low voice, and Bernie winced.

She started to say something, stuttering over the words, but he shook his head and said, in that same low, hopeful voice, “Serena’s in her office.”

She looked at him, startled, as he pushed her, gently, towards the office. Overwhelmed, she was on the verge of running for the nearest exit, but Serena’s letter crinkled again in her pocket and she took courage, squaring her shoulders and walking resolutely forward.

Bernie paused in the doorway to Serena’s office, eyes running over the familiar walls, the bookshelves stacked high with medical texts and journals, and - her breath quickened - Serena herself, medical uniform impeccable, even now, her head bent to paperwork piled on the desk. 

“Serena,” she said softly, and her voice broke a little. 

Serena glanced up from her papers, dark eyes clouded as if by tiredness or preoccupation, but her gaze caught and held on Bernie's own, and her mouth gaped open and she paused, seeming incapable of looking away.

“You told me to be fearless,” Bernie said, nearly a whisper, “so here I am.”

Serena stood up, slowly, dazed as if her limbs had forgotten how to move. She walked around her desk, fingertips trailing against its dark wooden surface, and came to a stop in front of Bernie, gaze still fixed on Bernie’s. And then her eyes broke away, glancing instead at Bernie’s uniform, and she reached up and ghosted her fingers, the lightest touch Bernie had ever felt, along the bare collar where Bernie’s rank insignia had once been pinned. 

“You resigned,” she said, so quietly that Bernie leaned forward a little. “You resigned from the SOE. For me?

Her last comment flicked out like a lash, with a note of sudden commanding, just as her eyes flicked upwards to catch Bernie’s own, their look wide and disbelieving and fierce. 

Bernie nodded. “The SOE saved me once,” she said, and her hands moved to clasp Serena’s elbows, the very faintest of touches. “But they couldn’t save me a second time, because I’d already been saved.”

Serena looked confused for a split second before the light behind her eyes shuttered and she began to move away. Bernie panicked, hands flying to frame Serena’s face, cradling her jaw with one hand and her shoulder with the other. "You did,” she said urgently. “You saved me.”

“I…?” Serena seemed incapable of finishing her question, but the light was back behind her eyes and her hand lay resting on Bernie’s collar, smoothing down her jacket and moving lightly over her collarbone.

“I love you, Serena,” Bernie said, and the room fell utterly silent.

Serena’s eyes were wide and her lips parted a little of their own accord. Her gaze held on to Bernie’s own as if she were lightning and Bernie was the earthing point. She leaned incrementally closer, and then - her gaze flicked down to Bernie’s lips and Bernie felt it like a physical touch. A spark of desire and joy flickered hot in her belly and she moved microscopically closer…

And then Serena closed the last remaining measure of distance and they were kissing, Serena’s hand knotted tight in the hair at the back of her head, a low moan bubbling up in a triumphant admission of need. Bernie’s hands cradled Serena, tipping her head at a better angle so their tongues slid together in a dance for all the ages, and they kissed and kissed until their lungs were burning for lack of oxygen. Eventually they moved apart, panting against each other’s lips until they caught their breath. Bernie opened her eyes, and Serena was already gazing at her, a small smile playing on her lips. 

Bernie opened her mouth to speak, but Serena put a finger against her lips to stop her, tracing her cupid’s bow, the edge of her mouth… Bernie’s mouth opened slightly at the sensation of Serena’s touch, and Serena leaned in for another kiss, full of hope and promise. “Oh my darling,” she said softly against Bernie’s lips. “I love you too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here’s some more lowlands dialect for you: smirr = a light, soft but persistent rain.  
> OK so the blue flowers thing - I doubt you’d find an independent reference to this (unfortunately) but: in the mid-1950s, when my grandparents were still living in Clydebank, most of the bomb sites were still extant. Places like the Kilbowie Road, in particular - my mum still remembers a set of stairs that had once led to a sweet shop, I think, before the war. When she grew up there after the war the stairs ended in mid-air. The blue flowers grew over the old bomb sites. For flowers to be blue (some of them, at least, I’m not a gardener!!) the soil needs to have a high calcium content. Calcium, in soil? Yeah - in some circumstances those who were killed under these buildings were simply left, even in the mid-50s; my mum said that all the kids knew that there were some buildings which still had bodies under them. Macabre, but. Anyway it's likely that decomposition wouldn’t have occurred sufficiently to power the flowers in the time Bernie’s been away, but w/e tbh.
> 
> A massive vote of thanks to everyone who’s stuck with this fic to the end! You’re amazing and I adore you all. 
> 
> A note about my sources:  
> I read ‘Untold Stories’, a series of personal accounts put together by the Clydebank Life Story Group. It’s available here https://education.gov.scot/improvement/Documents/soc4-untold-stories.pdf   
> I also listened to the sounds of the Jericho aircraft siren on youtube, as well as the sound of Stukas. Search for ‘Jericho WWII’ and you should find something good.


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